It would be hard for any scientist to top the heady entry Martin H. Studier had into his field.
A soldier fresh from the family farm in Minnnesota, Dr. Studier was admitted into the select company of researchers competing, they believed, with Hitler’s best minds to create the atomic bomb during World War II.
“It was quite an exciting time . . . Martin played quite a role,” said Nobel Prize winner Glen Seaborg. He hired Dr. Studier in the early 1940s as a member of the team working on the University of Chicago campus that helped capture the plutonium used in the first atomic bomb in Alamogordo, N.M., and the third bomb exploded in Nagasaki.
But that was not Dr. Studier’s last view of the cutting edge.
Originally attending Luther College in Iowa to play football, Dr. Studier eventually set off in a vastly different direction. He earned a doctorate in chemistry at the University of Chicago in 1947 and later helped discover two elements while distinguishing himself over a breath-taking range of subjects that included the origins of the solar system.
A longtime resident of Downers Grove, Dr. Studier, 80, died March 9 at ManorCare Health Services nursing home in Hinsdale.
“There are few like him. I was always impressed by his depth of knowledge over a wide range of disciplines,” said Dr. Dieter Gruen, who worked with Dr. Studier in the Materials Science and Chemistry Divisions of the Argonne National Laboratory.
It was there that in 1952 and 1953, Dr. Studier was part of a team that discovered that material retrieved from a hydrogen bomb test in the Pacific comprised elements never before seen–Elements 99 and 100, Einsteinium and Fermium.
But Dr. Studier did not limit himself to nuclear science. For example, he examined meteorites to learn what ingredients were in the cosmic soup of the universe. He was also an authority on the chemical composition of coal.
Almost as much for his mind, Dr. Studier was distinguished by his affability and fairness.
A citation from the 1978 University of Chicago Distinguished Service Award read, “Dr. Studier has been selfless in assisting others in their work . . . while maintaining the intensity of his own.”
“He had quite a network of people that would consult him. But he was not an empire-builder. He was a humble man,” Dr. Gruen said.
Dr. Studier retired in 1979. He spent his free time gardening, bee-keeping and playing classical guitar, his wife, Eleanor, said.
Other survivors include three sons, James, John and Paul; a daughter, Anne; two sisters and three grandchildren.
Services have been held for Dr. Studier.
