Eugenie Lisitzin

Eugenie Lisitzin (November 13, 1905 October 28, 1989 Gregorius had studied nearby in Vyborg, maintained absentee status through the 1900s, and later became an honorary member of the Technical Club; he was also influential in the Käkisalmi area where he was on the board of several railroad companies until Karelia became part of Russia.

Education The dedication from Lisitzin's 1938 dissertation, the first in physics by a Finnish woman Like her father, Eugenie began her formal studies in Vyborg, graduating in 1926 from the Vyborg Swedish-Speaking Girls' School. She then enrolled at the University of Helsinki, where she obtained the degree of Filosofian kandidaatti (Master’s level degree) in 1929. Nine years later, she became the first woman to receive a doctorate in physics in Finland in 1938; she received honor's distinctions in other subjects as well. Her advisor was professor Jarl Axel Wasastjerna, later an envoy and industrial leader, whom she thanked for "tireless interest and numerous valuable suggestions". Her 121 page thesis, written in German, was entitled "On the ionization potentials of the elements in different ionization states", and gave little hint of her future as an oceanographer. However, she also thanked the prolific mathematician and fisheries inspector Hjalmar Tallqvist for reviewing early drafts of her work, who may have helped her find a position after graduation.

Career After graduation, she worked for the Finnish Institute of Marine Research for 40 years, beginning in 1933, and serving as the head of the Sea Level Department from 1955 until her retirement in 1972. and her study on the factors affecting the sea level of the Gulf of Bothnia had been jointly presented to the Finnish Society of Scientists by director Erik Palmén and professor Einar Stenij in 1945. The last 15 years of her career developed a wider scope, including an important review of global tide data collected during the International Geophysical Year with fellow female oceanographer June Pattullo (Oregon State University), concluding that seasonal variation in Pacific sea level is influenced by air pressure above ~40 degrees latitude, but primarily isostatic below. She later generalized and expanded these findings into a short monograph that included the rest of the world's oceans. This work was carried out after she represented the institute at the first International Oceanographic Congress (1959) in New York City, and during a six-month stay at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in San Diego, California. Her studies culminated in the textbook "Sea Level Changes" (1974), which was notable for synthesizing meteorological and seasonal factors with long-term secular trends (even before the effects of global warming were widely appreciated), recalculating the rate of land uplift across Scandinavia, geological evidence of widespread change elsewhere, seiche waves, and anthropological discussion of legends of universal floods. The book examined meteorological, seasonal, and geological factors affecting sea level, including post-glacial isostatic rebound in Scandinavia and geological evidence from other regions. The volume became a widely cited reference work in oceanography and geophysics Eugenie Lisitzin died in Helsinki on 28 October 1989 at age 83.