[Continuity in personnel--change in contents: German physiologists in National Socialism and in the Federal Republic of Germany].

This paper illustrates how German physiologists during the Second World War succeeded in making a case for the relevance of their research for the war effort. In this way the paper contributes to the recent historical debate about how scientists--in this case the physiologists--could enforce their interests within the National Socialist system and to what extent they were "misused" by the political and military leaders. Most scientists were able to continue their careers in the new political system after 1945, using the old scientific network from the National Socialist era. They successfully changed their research topics, responding quickly to the new challenges in peace. As a typical example the career of the physiologist Hans Schäfer is described in this article.