Fabian Gerson

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Fabian Gerson (born March 23, 1926 in Lodz ; died June 8, 2011 in Basel ) was a Swiss chemist of Polish origin. He is known for his work in the field of electron spin resonance (ESR, EPR).

Life

Fabian Gerson's parents were Pinkus (Paweł) Gerson and Dora, geb. Con. His father founded his own textile company in the center of Lodz. Fabian learned to read, write and arithmetic at an early age on his own initiative. From 1932 he attended the Jewish high school, where he was placed directly in the second primary class. After the invasion of the German Wehrmacht, his mother and sister moved to Czestochowa in December 1939 , he followed with his father in October 1940. In September 1942, his parents and sister were deported to Treblinka ("without being able to say goodbye to them"). He was able to survive as a slave laborer in a HASAG armaments factory in Czestochowa. In January 1945 he was transported to Buchenwald concentration camp , where he was liberated in April.

In June 1945 he was transported to Switzerland by transporting young people, where it took years at several stations until he was able to cure various diseases ( pulmonary and bone tuberculosis ). In September 1949 he passed the federal Matura examination , in October 1951 he began studying natural sciences at the ETH Zurich . In 1955 he received his diploma, in 1958 he received his doctorate from Edgar Heilbronner (another source names Vladimir Prelog ) with the work physico-chemical properties and electronic structure of aryl-azo-azulenes and in 1965 his habilitation . The content of his habilitation thesis was published in book form. In 1969 he received a professorship at the University of Basel , initially as associate professor; In 1975 he was promoted to full professor of physical chemistry and retired in 1997.

In November 1962 he married Ingeborg Waldmann, their son Daniel was born in 1963 and their daughter Deborah in 1968.

Awards

Publications (selection)

  • F. Gerson and W. Huber: Electron Spin Resonance Spectroscopy of Organic Radicals. Wiley-VCH, Weinheim 2003, ISBN 978-3-527-30275-8 .

Autobiography

  • “… Without being able to say goodbye to them!” , Berlin: Jüdischer Verlag im Suhrkamp Verlag 2016, ISBN 978-3-633-54277-2 , series “I live with my past”; Issue 13

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Ivan Lefkovits , Daniel Gerson (editor): I live with my past, memoirs of Holocaust survivors . (PDF; 2790 kB).
  2. ^ Biographical data, publications and academic family tree of Fabian Gerson at academictree.org, accessed on February 7, 2018.
  3. ^ F. Gerson: High-resolution ESR spectroscopy. Verlag Chemie, Weinheim 1967.
personal data
SURNAME Gerson, Fabian
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Polish-Swiss chemist
DATE OF BIRTH March 23, 1926
PLACE OF BIRTH Lodz
DATE OF DEATH June 8, 2011
Place of death Basel