One of two Federation researchers stationed on Minara II to observe its dying star, abducted by the Vians and killed in the experiments later repeated on Kirk and McCoy.
Dr Linke is a scientist posted with his colleague Dr Ozaba to a research station on Minara II, whose sun is about to go nova. He appears in the third-season Original Series episode The Empath, played by Jason Wingreen.
When the Enterprise landing party arrives to collect the two men, the station is deserted. A recording shows them at work until an earth tremor is followed by a piercing sound, and first Ozaba and then Linke vanish from the room.
Kirk, Spock and McCoy are taken in the same way to an underground chamber, where they find the scientists' bodies preserved in transparent cylinders. The Vians explain that the men died during tests meant to show whether the empath Gem would give her life for another, and blame the deaths on the men's own fears.