Non Omnis Moriar
In memoriam Professor Aleksandra Krygier-Stojałowska
(2.10.1923 – 17.11.2015)

Professor Aleksandra Krygier-Stojałowska was born in Ryczywół, in Poland’s Wielkopolska Region, on 3 October 1923. She enrolled for medical studies in Poznań in 1946, and in 1951 she relocated to the Pomeranian Medical Academy (PMA)* to take up a position in the PMA’s Department of Pathological Anatomy. As it later turned out, she stayed for good. She graduated from the PMA in 1952, and in 1956 she was awarded the academic degree of candidate of medical sciences after submitting a thesis on “Nucleic acids in certain cancers of the peripheral nervous system (neuroblastomas, malignant schwannomas)”. The degree was verified as summa cum laude doctor of medical sciences in 1959. Also in 1959, Aleksandra Krygier-Stojałowska completed her specialization in pathological anatomy. She was awarded the academic degree of docent in 1961 after successfully defending her habilitation thesis on “Cytochemical and cytophotometric studies of fibroblasts in cell culture”. In 1972, she was appointed to the academic rank of associate professor, before achieving the full professorial title in 1989.
Prof. Krygier-Stojałowska was an extremely active and creative person with broad scientific interests. She was an author or co-author of over 200 reference publications in the field of connective tissue pathology, quantitative histo- and cytochemical methods (particularly cytophotometry), mechanisms of cancer cell proliferation and haematopoietic system pathology. Together with Prof. Henryk Godlewski, she co-edited the first Polish two-volume textbook entitled “Course Book of Histochemical Methods” and another textbook – “Topochemical Methods of Cell and Tissue Analysis”. Prof. Krygier-Stojałowska was also an active participant in a number of scientific symposiums and conferences, both in Poland and abroad.
Her professional interests centered mainly on histo- and cytochemistry, with a special focus on cytochemistry incorporating quantitative microscopic methods: cytophotometry and cytomorphometry. Prof. Krygier-Stojałowska established scientific contacts with Prof. Walter Sandritter, one of the most eminent experts in the field of cytophotometry. She completed three academic internships at prestigious research institutes in the Federal Republic of Germany. In 1959, she received a research fellowship from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, which was indisputably a mark of great distinction. Prof. Krygier-Stojałowska was the Foundation’s first Polish fellow after World...


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