Heinz Gerischer was a German chemist who specialized in electrochemistry.
13 Facts About Heinz Gerischer
1.
2.
Heinz Gerischer was the thesis advisor of future Nobel laureate Gerhard Ertl.
3.
In Leipzig, Heinz Gerischer joined the group of Karl-Friedrich Bonhoffer, a member of a distinguished family, whose members were persecuted and murdered because of their opposition to Nazi ideology.
4.
Heinz Gerischer kindled Gerischer's interest in electrochemistry, supervising his doctoral work on oscillating reactions on electrode surfaces.
5.
Heinz Gerischer met his future wife, Renate Gersdorf, at the University of Leipzig where she was doing her diploma work with Conrad Weygand.
6.
In 1949 Heinz Gerischer moved his young family to Gottingen to join Bonhoffer as a research associate at the newly established Max Planck Institute for Physical Chemistry.
7.
In Berlin and Gottingen and especially during the period from 1949 to 1955, Heinz Gerischer was interested in electrode kinetics and developed instruments and techniques for their study.
8.
Heinz Gerischer monitored fast electrode processes by double potential step and AC modulation.
9.
Heinz Gerischer was appointed in 1954 to the position of Department Head and Senior Research Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Metal Research in Stuttgart.
10.
Heinz Gerischer recognized the theoretical implications of semiconductor electrochemistry in charge transfer and its potential applications in photochemistry and photovoltaic devices.
11.
Heinz Gerischer's papers considered the differentiation between Faradaic reactions of electrons and holes, the theory of electron tunneling at semiconductor-electrolyte interfaces, solution Fermi levels, and densities of states.
12.
Heinz Gerischer extended his studies to metal electrodes which he studied with his electronic potentiostat, to stress corrosion, to hydrogen evolution and hydrogen adatom formation, to fast electrode processes and to the reaction kinetics of water dissociation, which he probed by the microwave pulse method.
13.
Heinz Gerischer returned to Berlin in 1970 to assume the directorship of the Fritz Haber Institute of the Max Planck Society, where he continued his studies of electrode kinetics, semiconductor electrochemistry, and photoelectrochemistry.