What will remain after the retirement of H. Finkelmann?

That’s the first question that comes to our mind when we think about the retirement of our PhD mentor Heino Finkelmann. In February, after nearly 30 years as full professor, his time at the Institute of Macromolecular Chemistry of the University of Freiburg came to an end. On the occasion of his 65th birthday Ansgar Komp, Tony Sanchez-Ferrer, and Kirsten Severing wrote a laudation for Macromolecular Chemistry and Physics.

During his PhD thesis in the group of Professor Stegemeyer he became familiar with the fascinating field of liquid crystals. This interest he merged with the investigation of the chemo-physical properties of polymers and polymeric networks in the research of liquid crystalline elastomers, which combine anisotropic liquid crystalline behavior with the entropy-elasticity of polymers. Even though he was a convinced supporter of basic research being of greatest importance at universities, he was not averse to potential applications of the results of his research. He was very open minded and willing to share his ideas and findings with colleagues from all over the world in numerous cooperations, including more application-oriented research groups. This resulted in around 300 publications of great interest for the scientific community, for example on tunable mirrorless lasers or the coupling between liquid crystalline order and mechanical fields as a fundamental research topic.

The strategy for his scientific success was hard work combined with curiosity and joy, which he transferred in an infectious way to his PhD students. During his time in Freiburg about 80 PhD students carried out research on the synthesis, characterization, and application of side-chain and main-chain liquid crystalline elastomers. HIs technical background as a chemical engineer provided the knowledge for several self-constructed apparatus for the synthesis of oriented liquid crystalline polymer films and investigation of their mechanical, optical, and electrical properties. He was always aware of the fact that he owed the success of his research partly to the support of the institute’s technicians, who in turn respected him as a competent boss and director of the institute.

However, besides teaching the theoretical and practical scientific skills his main message was: ask your colleagues for advice, work systematically, question your findings, but overall, don’t forget the fun!



So, what will be the scientific heritage of H. Finkelmanns work?

“The majority of liquid crystalline elastomer samples was synthesized in Heino’s group in Freiburg.” Helmut R. Brand, his long-time colleague and friend from the University of Bayreuth is therefore convinced, „that on a timescale of 1-2 years the number of experiments performed on LC elastomers will significantly decrease. In other words, the scientific field will relax.”

We hope that what will remain are the relationships between Finkelmann's former group members. The atmosphere that we experienced in our time as PhD students we try to maintain by keeping in touch.

According to H. R. Brand, Finkelmann and he always agreed on the fact that „the degrees of freedom of an academic researcher have drastically decreased over the last 20 years. Only a smaller percentage of their time can nowadays be devoted to science because administrative tasks, applying for external funding and university politics require more and more time. This makes life for young researchers less attractive.”

Administration and university politics are now a thing of the past. He can address his curiosity and enthusiasm to all kind of moving vehicles. For his well-deserved retirement we wish our former board member H. Finkelmann, also on behalf of the editorial office, all the best.

Kirsten Severing and Rebekka Storz
Editors, Macromolecular Journals