The Sigrid Peyerimhoff Prizes were awarded for the fourth time this year. The funding award worth 2,000 euros went to Ms. Claudia Gräve, while Mr. Stefan Flesch received the research award worth 3,000 euros. The two honorees presented their respective research results at the opening meeting in the winter semester 2023/24 of the Bonn local association of the Society of German Chemists. The founder, Prof. Dr. Sigrid Peyerimhoff, took part in the event.
Since the Sigrid Peyerimhoff Prizes were introduced in 2020, two outstanding young talents from the chemistry department have been honored with this special award every year. In keeping with the spirit of the founder, who established the foundation fund of the same name under the umbrella of the Bonn University Foundation in 2019.
This year Ms. M. Sc. Claudia Gräve received the sponsorship prize worth 2,000 euros. In her master's thesis entitled "Time-Resolved and Temperature-Dependent Stationary Infrared Spectroscopy of Calix[4]arene", the young scientist deals with cyclic hydrogen bond networks and uses a specialized method of multi-dimensional femtosecond infrared laser spectroscopy.
The main deciding factor in the selection committee's decision was that Ms. Gräve submitted an excellent master's thesis in which she acquired complex spectroscopic techniques. Not only did she manage to generate an accurate data set for the calixarene systems and thus provide information about their hydrogen bonds, but she also provided a very involved elucidation of the spectra.
The research prize worth 3,000 euros was awarded to Mr. M. Sc. Stefan Flesch awarded. Flesch completed both his bachelor's and master's degrees at the University of Bonn with outstanding grades. Since October 2019 he has been working in the working group of Professor Dr. to prepare his doctoral thesis. Peter Vöhringer works at the Clausius Institute for Physical and Theoretical Chemistry at the University of Bonn. His master's thesis, in which Flesch dealt with the synthesis, structure and photochemistry of azido complexes of trivalent cobalt, was published in a renowned journal and was honored with a Kekulé doctoral scholarship from the Chemical Industry Fund.
The title of the Peyerimhoff Prize-winning publication is “Ultrafast dynamics of photochemical nitrile imine formation” by Stefan Flesch and Peter Vöhringer. The selection committee was extremely impressed by the substance of the scientific work and was particularly impressed by the combination of very sophisticated experiments and theoretical calculations. Mr. Flesch's personal contribution to this work was also extremely high. This work was published in the extremely renowned magazine Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2023, 61, e202205803.
To the endowment fund
In 2019, chemist emeritus Sigrid Peyerimhoff set up an endowment fund under the umbrella of the University Foundation. The aim of the foundation is to promote the field of chemistry in science and research at the University of Bonn. To fulfill this purpose, a so-called consumption fund was set up, which annually awards the Sigrid Peyerimhoff sponsorship prize - worth 2,000 euros for an outstanding master's thesis by a student in chemistry - and the Sigrid Peyerimhoff research prize - worth 3,000 euros to a young scientist a young scientist for an outstanding publication (e.g. dissertation, habilitation thesis, postdoc thesis) in the field of physical and theoretical chemistry.
To person
The scientist, born in 1937, conducted research at renowned universities in the USA for a long time after studying physics and earning her doctorate at the University of Giessen. After completing her habilitation and working in Giessen and Mainz, Sigrid Peyerimhoff taught as a professor of theoretical chemistry at the University of Bonn from 1972 to 2002. From 2006 to 2009 she was President of the renowned "International Academy of Quantum Molecular Science" based in Menton (France). 14 of her students later became university lecturers in physical or theoretical chemistry in various countries, including 6 women. She has been honored with many prizes and awards for her outstanding work, including the Leibniz Prize of the German Research Foundation, the Federal Cross of Merit First Class and the Grand Federal Cross of Merit.