{{Short description|Austrian inventor, mineralogist, and ophthalmologist}} {{Infobox person | name = Adelheid Kofler | image = Ludwig Kofler01.jpg | imagesize = | caption = Adelheid and Ludwig Kofler (front) c. 1940 | othername = | birth_name = Adelheid Schaschek | birth_date = 24 June 1889 | birth_place = Haugsdorf, Austria | death_date = 27 July 1985 | death_place = Innsbruck, Austria | burial_place = | alma_mater = University of Vienna, Ph.D., M.D. | occupation = Inventor, mineralogist, and ophthalmologist | years_active = | known_for = Thermomicroscopy<br>Kofler bench | awards = Fritz Pregl Prize (1954) | spouse = Ludwig Kofler | children = Two sons and one daughter | mother = | father = | signature = }} '''Adelheid Kofler''' {{nee|Schaschek}} (24 June 1889, Haugsdorf – 27 July 1985, Innsbruck) was an Austrian inventor, mineralogist, and ophthalmologist. She was among the early women to receive both Ph.D. and M.D. degrees from the University of Vienna.
==Biography== After attending public school in Amstetten, Lower Austria, '''Adelheid Schaschek''' she studied from 1903 to 1907 at the municipal girls' lyceum in Brno, Czech Republic. From 1907 to 1911, she studied at the University of Vienna. In 1911, she passed the teaching examination, which qualified her to teach mathematics, natural history, and physics to female students at lyceums. In 1912, she passed a further examination, qualifying her to teach at teacher training institutions and higher schools for girls. She subsequently taught at the girls' lyceum in the Viennese district of Mariahilf.
Under the direction of Friedrich Johann Karl Becke, she completed her doctoral dissertation on mineralogy and received her Ph.D. from the University of Vienna in 1913. Beginning in 1917, she studied medicine at the same university, earning her M.D. in 1921 and specializing in ophthalmology.<ref name="KA">{{cite web|title=Kofler, Adelheid|website=Österreichisches Biographisches Lexikon ab 1815 (2. überarbeitete Auflage - online ), Austrian Centre for Digital Humanities and Cultural Heritage|url=}}</ref>
In 1921, she married the pharmacologist Ludwig Kofler (1891–1951) in Vienna.<ref>{{cite journal|author=Hickel, Erika|title=Kofler, Ludwig|journal=Neue Deutsche Biographie [Online-Version]|volume=12|year=1979|page=420|url=https://www.deutsche-biographie.de/gnd13412944X.html#ndbcontent}}(in German)</ref>
In 1925, Adelheid Kofler moved with her family to Innsbruck. From the early 1930s, she assisted her husband in his research at the University of Innsbruck's pharmacognostics institute. Applying her knowledge of mineralogy, she conducted studies on the behavior of mixed crystals during melting and crystallization. Together with her husband, she developed the Kofler hot microscope (thermomicroscope)<ref name=KA/><ref name="KumarSingh2020">{{cite journal|last1=Kumar|first1=Arun|last2=Singh|first2=Pritam|last3=Nanda|first3=Arun|title=Hot stage microscopy and its applications in pharmaceutical characterization|journal=Applied Microscopy|volume=50|issue=1|year=2020|page=12|issn=2287-4445|doi=10.1186/s42649-020-00032-9|pmid=33580349|pmc=7818341|s2cid=219692412|doi-access=free}}</ref> and the Kofler hot bench.<ref name=KA/><ref name=":0">{{cite journal|author=Sella, Andrea|date=4 December 2018|title=The Koflers' Hotbench|journal=Chemistry World|url=https://www.chemistryworld.com/opinion/the-koflers-hotbench/3009792.article}}</ref> Much of her research focused on polymorphism, collaborating with fellow researcher, Maria Kuhnert-Brandstätter.<ref name=KA/> thumb|262x262px|Kofler hot bench with samples for calibration.
The joint research conducted by the Koflers combined their respective academic strengths.<blockquote>Ludwig next reported a method for determining refractive index using his hot stage: the unknown would be mixed with a few fragments of one of 23 different grades of glass; these vanished when the refractive index of glass and melt matched. Developing these ideas further, the Koflers devised a microscale version of the Rast molecular weight method, with camphor and the unknown together on the heated stage. Then Adelheid put two substances side-by-side on the stage and could both watch them melt separately and observe their interaction at the interface. This led to studies of co-crystals and eutectics. Photomicrographs illustrate these magnificent papers.<ref name=":0" /></blockquote>They had a daughter, Erika (1922–2012), and two sons, Helmut and Walter (born 1928). Walter collaborated on research with his father in the late 1940s and early 1950s. Ludwig Kofler died by suicide in 1951.<ref name=":0" />
==Awards and honors== * 1954 — Fritz Pregl Prize * 1980 — Österreichischen Ehrenkreuze für Wissenschaft und Kunst, 1st class
==Selected publications== *{{cite journal|title=Mikroskopische Untersuchung der Mutterkornalkaloide. I. Ergotamin und Ergotaminin|year=1936|last1=Kofler|first1=Adelheid|journal=Archiv der Pharmazie|volume=274|issue=7|pages=398–414|doi=10.1002/ardp.19362740704|s2cid=95745507}} (Microscopic investigations of the ergot alkaloids I. Ergotamine and Ergotamine) *{{cite journal|doi=10.1002/ange.19400533708|title=Der Mischschmelzpunkt unter dem Mikroskop|year=1940|last1=Kofler|first1=Ludwig|last2=Kofler|first2=Adelheid|author-mask2=2|journal=Angewandte Chemie|volume=53|issue=37–38|pages=434–435|bibcode=1940AngCh..53..434K }} *{{cite journal|doi=10.1002/cber.19420750812|title=Über die Isodimorphie von β-Naphthol und Naphthalin|year=1942|last1=Kofler|first1=Adelheid|author-mask=2|journal=Berichte der Deutschen Chemischen Gesellschaft (A and B Series)|volume=75|issue=8|pages=998–1001}} *{{cite journal|doi=10.1002/cber.19430760906|title=Zur Polymorphie organischer Stoffe: Acridin, Brenzcatechin, Diphenylamin und Korksäure|year=1943|last1=Kofler|first1=Adelheid|author-mask=2|journal=Berichte der Deutschen Chemischen Gesellschaft (A and B Series)|volume=76|issue=9|pages=871–873}} (Polymorphism of organic substances: acridine, catechol, diphenylamine and suberic acid) *{{cite journal|doi=10.1007/BF01469010|title=Mikro-Thermoanalyse organischer Zweistoffsysteme|year=1943|last1=Kofler|first1=Adelheid|author-mask=2|journal=Die Naturwissenschaften|volume=31|issue=47–48|pages=553–557|bibcode=1943NW.....31..553K|s2cid=32579999}} *{{cite journal|doi=10.1002/cber.19500830616|title=Hydrate unter dem Heizmikroskop|year=1950|last1=Kofler|first1=Adelheid|author-mask=2|journal=Chemische Berichte|volume=83|issue=6|pages=594–599}} *{{cite journal|doi=10.1002/cber.19510840406|title=Zur Kenntnis der Hexachlor-cyclohexane und ihrer Gemische, I. Mitteil.: Polymorphie|year=1951|last1=Kofler|first1=Adelheid|author-mask=2|journal=Chemische Berichte|volume=84|issue=4|pages=376–381}} *{{cite book|author=Kofler, L.|author2=Kofler, A.|author-mask2=2|year=1954|edition=enlarged, 3rd|title=Thermo-Mikro-Methoden zur Kennzeichnung organischer Stoffe und Stoffgemische|publisher=Verlag Chemie}} (Micro-Methods for the Identification of Organic Substances and Mixtures of Substances; 1st edition, 1945; 2nd edition, 1948) *{{cite journal|doi=10.1007/BF00902291|title=Mikrothermoanalyse des Systems NaNO<sub>3</sub>-KNO<sub>3</sub>|year=1955|last1=Kofler|first1=Adelheid|author-mask=2|journal=Monatshefte für Chemie und Verwandte Teile Anderer Wissenschaften|volume=86|issue=4|pages=643–652}}
==References== <references/>
{{Authority control}} {{DEFAULTSORT:Kofler, Adelheid}}
Category:1889 births Category:1985 deaths Category:University of Vienna alumni Category:Austrian mineralogists Category:Austrian chemists Category:Austrian women chemists Category:20th-century Austrian chemists Category:20th-century Austrian inventors Category:20th-century Austrian women scientists