Gertrude Rempfer

Gertrude F. Rempfer (January 30, 1912 – October 4, 2011) was an American physicist notable for her innovations in electron microscopy and who also was a civil rights activist. In particular, she made innovations in instrumentation that resulted in significant improvements in the capability of electron microscopes.

Rempfer's innovations in electron microscopy extended to both transmission electron microscopy and photoemission electron microscopy. Her contributions included the design and improvement of the instrumentation, the actual instrument construction, and the application of electron microscopy in fields such as surface science, solid state physics, and biology. Rempfer was a university professor and at times worked in private industry and for the Manhattan Project.

Scientific career

Early career Following completion of her doctoral dissertation, Rempfer served as a physics instructor for one year at Mount Holyoke College and then for two years at Russell Sage College. In 1942, Rempfer became a part of the Manhattan Project as a physicist, first at the United States Naval Research Laboratory and then at the Special Alloy Materials Laboratories, which was housed at Columbia University.

Academic appointments Beginning in 1951, Rempfer with her husband Robert Rempfer held a series of faculty positions at colleges and universities. Rempfer was an associate professor of engineering at Antioch College, while her husband was on the mathematics faculty at the same institution. There were considerable attacks on academic freedom stemming from the anti-communist fervor of the times, which were at odds with the stated positions of the Rempfers favoring civil liberties. The resulting conflict at Antioch College necessitated that the Rempfers move on to faculty positions at Fisk University beginning in 1953. However, the faculty appointments of the Rempfers at Fisk University likewise became untenable because of the positions of the Rempfers favoring racial integration. As a result, they moved on to faculty positions at Pacific University in 1957 before settling at Portland State University where they remained for the duration of their academic careers.

Electron microscopes had limitations in resolution due to chromatic aberrations and spherical aberrations. In collaboration with an interdisciplinary team at the University of Oregon, Rempfer invented an electron mirror that corrected resolution limitations due to aberrations, thereby much improving the resolution of electron microscopes.

Rempfer had a long-standing collaboration with biologist O. Hayes Griffith who was on the faculty at the University of Oregon. The two explored the use of photoemission electron microscopy to biological systems, the technique having the advantages of minimal sample size, minimal sample damage, and high contrast between various biological structures. The advantages are a consequence of the high surface sensitivity of photoemission electron microscopy. Rempfer and Griffith developed applications of the microscopy technique to DNA and to biological cell structures, achieving a resolution of up to 8 nanometers. The collaboration resulted in several publications in academic journals.

Personal life While teaching at Mount Holyoke College in Troy, New York, Rempfer (then known as Gertrude Fleming) met Robert Rempfer, who was a professor of mathematics at nearby Rennselaer Polytechnic Institute. The two of them subsequently married, eventually having five children together.

Honors and recognition In 1987 Rempfer became the first woman to receive the Howard Vollum Award for Distinguished Accomplishment in Science and Technology, presented at Reed College.

Ohio University awarded Rempfer an honorary doctorate of science in 1992 for her scientific accomplishments while recognizing the circumstances under which she left Antioch College. Fisk University presented Rempfer with a certificate of service at its 1996 Freedom Day Convocation, which was a recognition of her stance on racial integration at the time she was a faculty member there. The award certificate from Fisk University stated: "One Concerned for the Greater Good of Humankind." Rempfer's name was enshrined on the "Walk of the Heroines" at Portland State University.

In 2012, the scientific journal Ultramicroscopy published an issue posthumously honoring the scientific achievements of Rempfer.

In 2017 Vanderbilt University athletics posthumously honored Rempfer and her husband Robert Rempfer for their civil rights efforts while they were faculty members at nearby Fisk University.

Representative journal articles and patents Face Page of US Patent 4096386, Gertrude F. Rempfer, coinventor Rempfer, Gertrude F. "A theoretical study of the hyperbolic electron mirror as a correcting element for spherical and chromatic aberration in electron optics." Journal of Applied Physics 67.10 (1990): 6027–6040. Griffith, O. Hayes, Rempfer, Gertrude F., "Photoelectron Imaging in Cell Biology", Ann. Rev. Biophys. Biophys. Chem. 14, 113–130 (1985). Rempfer, Gertrude F. Electron Diffraction Voltmeter, United States Patent 3,350,640, December 23, 1963.