Andreas Gemant

Andreas Gemant , born Andreas Gyemant ; after change of name Andrew Gemant , (born July 27, 1895 in Großwardein , Hungary, † February 1, 1983 in Detroit ) was an Austrian-American physicist.

Life and activity

Gemant was the son of Eugen Gyemant and his wife Vilma, née Berkow. As a medical student, Gemant took part in the First World War with the Imperial and Royal Army. In 1919 he received a medical degree from the University of Budapest . From 1920 to 1922 he studied at the Friedrich Wilhelm University in Berlin . During this time he worked in the laboratories of Leonor Michaelis and Herbert Freundlich . In 1922 he received his doctorate in physics.

He completed his habilitation with a thesis on physical chemistry. From 1925 to 1932 was a member of the research department of the Siemens-Schuckert cable factory in Berlin and at the same time from 1928 to 1933 private lecturer for high voltage technology at the Technical University of Berlin . From 1932 to 1933 he worked briefly at the Heinrich Hertz Institute for Oscillation Research.

In 1933 Gemant emigrated to Great Britain. He received a position at the Engineering Laboratory at Oxford University , financed among other things by donations from the Metropolitan-Vickers Electric Company , where he worked until 1937.

In 1938 Gemant went to the United States. There he did research from 1938 to 1939 at the Electrical Engineering Department of the University of Wisconsin. From 1940 to 1960 he worked for the Detroit Edison Company as a physicist. Since 1961 he has been a research associate at Grace Hospital in Detroit. He held this position until 1971. His last position was from 1972 to 1983 in the Department of Biochemistry at Wayne State University .

Gemant wrote an autobiography around 1963, which is now kept in the Niels-Bohr Library.

Gemant's main research interests were the fluorescence of X-rays, viscoelasticity, fractional differentials, high voltage physics, the electrochemistry of oils and high voltage cables.

The Andrew Gemant Award is named after Gemant and has been presented annually by the American Institute of Physics since 1987 to people who, in the Institute's opinion, have achieved outstanding achievements in the field of physics.

family

Gemant was married to Sophia Ida "Susie" Marie Staap since 1933.

Fonts

• The frequency response of the breakdown voltage in the thermal area , 1934. (together with Karl Willy Wagner)

literature

• Nathan Kravetz: Displaced German Scholars. A Guide to Academics in peril in Nazi Germany , 1936.
• Allen G. Debus: World Who's who in Science: A Biographical Dictionary of Notable Scientists from Antiquity to the Present , 1968, p. 642.