Erika Pannwitz

Erika Pannwitz (May 26, 1904 in Hohenlychen, Germany – November 25, 1975 in Berlin[1]) was a German mathematician who worked in the area of geometric topology.

After passing her teaching exam in 1927 (in mathematics, physics, and chemistry), Pannwitz was promoted in 1931 to Dr Phil at Friedrich Wilhelms University with doctoral advisors Heinz Hopf and Erhard Schmidt.

[4] Her thesis titled: Eine elementargeometrische Eigenschaft von Verschlingungen und Knoten (An elementary geometric property of entanglements and knots), which appeared two years later in the prestigious journal Mathematische Annalen, was honored opus eximium being considered an outstanding thesis.

Hopf in particular wrote eight pages of comments and left a summary quoted below: Since, in my opinion, both the objective scientific value of this work and the subjective achievement in it exceed the level of good dissertations, I ask the faculty to accept the work submitted by Miss Pannwitz as a dissertation with the rating "eximium".

After Germany's defeat in World War II, she briefly held an assistant position at Marburg University.