Jean-Marie Friedt - 1940-2008

It is with deepest sadness that the French Group of Mössbauer Spectroscopy announces the passing of Dr Jean-Marie Friedt in November 2008.

Jean-Marie Friedt, who was born in 1940, graduated in Strasbourg, France, with a degree in engineering. As a volunteer to non-active military service, Jean-Marie went to Brazil (the Centro Brasileiro de Pesquisas Físicas, or CBPF, in Rio de Janeiro) and then joined Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) as a researcher, returning to the Nuclear Research Centre of Strasbourg-Cronenbourg, where he worked until 1986. He received his Ph.D. degree in 1969 from the University of Strasbourg, with a thesis devoted to "Mössbauer spectrometry of Fe from electronic capture of ⁵⁷Co in cobalt alloys." While at CNRS, Jean-Marie was awarded the CNRS Bronze Medal.

Jean-Marie developed a Mössbauer laboratory with wide experimental facilities, giving rise to various isotopes including rare earth and actinides (⁵⁷Fe, ¹¹⁹Sn, ¹⁵¹Eu, ¹²¹Sb, ¹²⁹I, ¹⁶¹Dy, ¹⁵⁵Gd, ¹⁶⁹Er, ¹⁷⁰Yb, ¹⁹⁷Au, ²³¹Pa, and ²³⁷Np). The main topics were oriented to metallurgy, disordered solid states (oxide glasses, rare earth-based metglasses, spin glasses), magnetism of rare earth and actinide systems, and density of charge and of spin in insulating and conducting systems. Jean-Marie and his coworkers, including Jean-Pierre Sanchez and Marc Maurer, worked in collaboration with different French institutes (including the Recherche sur la catalyse in Lyon, Curie in Paris, CEA in Saclay, and ENSC and Le Bel in Strasbourg) and also internationally, including researchers at the Technical University of Munich (M. Kalvius, F. Wagner, and J. Litterst), Bochum University (H. Micklitz), Kyoto University (T. Shinjo), the CBPF in Rio de Janeiro (J. Danon and E. Baggio-Saitovitch), and the Nuclear Physics Institute and the University of Krakow (A. Hrynkiewicz and K. Tomala).

His scientific activities are recognized through about 80 publications and book chapters, and he was a very active member of the French Group of Mössbauer spectroscopy during the 1980s.

Jean-Marie was invited for long stays at Argonne National Laboratory in the United States and in Munich, and many scientists were his guests at Strasbourg in the frame of international bilateral scientific agreements, among them J. Danon, G. Shenoy, H. Micklitz, J. Litterst, A. Hrynkiewicz, M. Pasternak, and A. Vasquez.

After 1986, Jean-Marie moved from CNRS to the Air Liquide Company, first in Paris and then in Japan, where he became the Manager of the Technological Development.

Our thoughts are with his family.

Francisco Eiichi Fujita - 1924-2007

We were saddened to learn that Professor Dr. Francisco Eiichi Fujita passed on 1 December 2007. The funeral ceremony was held in the Catholic Church of Ashiya, Kobe, Japan, on 2 December. Professor Fujita was born in Hong Kong in 1924. He graduated from The University of Tokyo, and subsequently worked as a research assistant at the Research Institute of Iron, Steel and Other Metals at Tohoku University, and as a group leader at the Japan Atomic Energy Research Institute. After a position as a research associate with the Brookhaven National Laboratory in the US, he was appointed as Professor of Metal Physics in the Faculty of Engineering Science, Osaka University, in 1963. After retiring from Osaka University in 1989, becoming Professor Emeritus, he moved to the Shizuoka Institute of Science and Technology in Fukuroi, and later served as a science adviser at Sumitomo Metal Industries, Ltd.

Professor Fujita was devoted not only to education and research, but was also a member of various meeting committees and a sub-chairman of the Japan Institute of Metals. He was a representative scientist of the Japanese Mössbauer community for many years, and was a member of the Organizing Committee of ICAME in Kyoto 1979. It is well known that Professor Fujita was one of the most familiar friends of Professor Ulrich Gonser, who passed on 12 December 2007. His enthusiastic efforts, especially in education and research works in metal physics, were so fruitful that his many students have made excellent contributions to both academia and industry.

Professor Fujita was one of the pioneers in metal physics in Japan. He studied lattice defects, including dislocation theory, deformation and fracture mechanism, and radiation damage, in a wide varieties of materials. The alloy phase diagram, martensitic transformation, hydrogen in metals, and amorphous materials were studied using the electron microscope, Mössbauer spectroscopy, and other new methods in materials science. He was highly appreciated for his scientific achievements. He was awarded the Honda Memorial Prize in 2000, and was decorated with Zuihou Chujyushou (one of the most honorable medals) from the Emperor in 2006.

His warm character and sincere attitude toward scientific works shall be never forgotten.

Ulrich Gonser - 1922-2007

Professor Ulrich Gonser passed away on 12 December 2007 at the age of 85. Uli Gonser is a giant of Mössbauer spectroscopy, having published more than 400 papers, books, and chapters in the field, and was the first Honorary Member of the International Board on the Applications of the Mössbauer Effect (IBAME). He was the first to use the Mössbauer effect to study lattice defects, initiated the first systematic study of the magnetic phase transitions of fcc iron, developed Mössbauer polarimetry as a tool to determine the orientation of magnetization, and triggered the first Mössbauer studies of the potential optical storage material iron-doped lithium niobate. Professor Gonser’s students and followers can be found all over the world.

A brief biographical sketch of Professor Gonser can be found on this Web site by clicking here. Additionally, a tribute in memory of Professor Gonser was published in the January 2008 edition of the Mössbauer Spectroscopy Newsletter, and is downloadable in PDF format at right.

E. F. Makarov – 1929-2007

Professor E. F. Makarov, the main scientific worker at the Institute of Chemical Physics of the Russian Avademy of Sciences in Moscow, passed on June 5, 2007. He was born on 31 December 1929 in Simferopol (Crimea). Professor Makarov was one of the first Mössbauer researchers in the USSR, working with Professor V. I. Goldanskii. In collaboration with Professor Goldanskii, he published “Fundamentals of Gamma-Resonance Spectroscopy” in the book                               Chemical Applications of Mössbauer Spectroscopy, edited by Professor Goldanskii and Professor Rolf Herber. Professor Makarov’s scientific activity covered many fields, including the anisotropy of atomic motion (the Goldanskii-Karyagin effect) and high temperature superconductivity. He created the device for casiterite (SnO                               2) mineral testing. Professor Makarov was nominated as Soros Professor and was Professor of Physics in the D. I. Mendeleev Institute of Chemical Technology. According to the records of the Mösbauer Effect Data Center, Professor Makarov published over 200 papers related to Mössbauer spectroscopy.

Information submitted by Professor Igor P. Suzdalev

Gilbert J. Perlow – 1916-2007

Gilbert Jerome Perlow, a Mössbauer pioneer, noted physicist, and a leader in Argonne National Laboratory’s Physics Division for many years, died February 17, 2007, in Downers Grove, Illinois, USA, at age 91. Gil Perlow was born in New York City in 1916 and received his B.A. from Cornell in 1936 and a Ph.D. in physics from The University of Chicago in 1940. He married the late Mina Rea Jones, a Ph.D. chemist. The two collaborated both in life and on research projects. During World War II, Gil worked at the Naval Ordinance Laboratory and then at the Naval Research Laboratory on underwater submarine detection. Later he carried out some of the first experiments on radiation in space using captured German V-2 rockets.

He became a staff member at Argonne National Lab in 1953. He was a pioneer in utilizing the Mössbauer effect to determine the internal magnetic fields of iron atoms and substances such as the newly created compounds of the noble gas xenon. He was frequently sought out as a distinguished visitor by noted international laboratories. Perlow’s intense interest in the practical applications of science led him to become the editor for two decades of the Journal of Applied Physics and of Applied Physics Letters.

Gil Perlow retired from Argonne in 1986, but retained his delight in science and joy in learning how things work and remained active. Gil was a member of the National Wildlife Federation, and was also an avid sailor and Commodore of the Chicago Corinthian Yacht Club.

Information in this Milestone was taken from the Argonne News, the employee publication of the Argonne National Laboratory from its Web site, and the Harrodsburg (Kentucky) Herald, which contributions are gratefully acknowledged.