Heinz Wolff
Heinz Wolff, 1928-2017
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2017/dec/17/heinz-wolff-obituary
Heinz Siegfried Wolff (1928-2017)
Scientist and broadcaster
Lived in: Wyldes Close Corner, 100 Willifield Way and 53 Meadway
- Scientist and television presenter
- Grew up in Weimar Germany before fleeing to the Netherlands and England
- Lifelong passions were engineering solutions to human problems as well as helping the elderly and those with disabilities
- Presented The Great Egg Race for BBC2
Heinz Wolff was a distinguished British scientist who became an even more distinguished television presenter and apostle of science. He hosted a pioneering TV programme called The Great Egg Race, inspiring thousands of young viewers to take up careers in engineering or research. He was born in Berlin and grew up during the Weimar Republic; in 1938 the family fled to the Netherlands and then to Britain. He began his scientific career as a lab technician at the Radcliffe Infirmary in Oxford, taking a degree in physics and physiology at University College London. His lifelong passion was the engineering of solutions to human problems. These could be as simple as the challenge to the elderly of getting out of a car, or to an astronaut in freefall or a diver at dangerous atmospheric pressures. Early in his career, Wolff became a scientist who made things happen: he joined the European Space Agency’s life science working group in its early years, he advised the British National Space Centre and he served on the board of the Edinburgh international science festival. In 1983 he founded the Brunel Institute for Bioengineering and in the course of a research career authored or co-authored around 120 papers in scientific journals. His career as a television presenter and personality is the most often remembered. The Great Egg Race ran for 68 editions on BBC2. It developed into a hugely enjoyable series of studio tests of creativity based on makeshift tools and improvised gadgets. Wolff was interested in helping elderly people and those with disabilities and worked with the Young Foundation and Age UK. He was awarded honorary doctorates by the Open University, de Montfort in Leicester, Middlesex University and Oxford Brookes.
