Cremer, Erika (1900–1996)

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Cremer, Erika (1900–1996)

German-born Austrian physicist and chemist.

Born May 20, 1900, in Munich, Germany; died Sept 21, 1996; University of Berlin, PhD in physical chemistry (1927).

Called the mother of chromatography, worked with eminent chemists Karl Bonhoeffer, George de Hevesy, Michael Polanyi, and Otto Hahn; obtained teaching position at University of Innsbruck in Austria due to labor shortages caused by World War II (1940); developed plans for gas chromatography machine to separate compounds from a gaseous mixture, but much of the information was lost in bombings and air raids during war; after war, continued developing gas chromatography (one important use of which is to measure gases in blood); published results and was appointed professor of chemistry at University of Innsbruck (1951).