Karl Pfleger was appointed head of the Department of Toxicology at the Saarland University in Homburg/Saar, Germany, in 1967. In the late 1970s he developed, together with his PhD student Hans H. Maurer, novel analysis procedures for identification and Quantification of drugs, poisons and their metabolites in body samples. they introduced mass spectrometry as the gold standard into clinical and forensic toxicology. In 1985, they published the first edition of their unique handbook of GC and MS data together with Armin A. Weber (left), who was and is responsible for all technical and software developments, including the mass spectral database that was developed from the printed collection. In 1987, Karl Pfleger received the Jean-Servais Stas Medal of the Gesellschaft fur Toxikologische und Forensische Chemie (GTFCh). In 1992, Karl Pfleger retired and Hans H. Maurer became his successor as professor and head of the department. His main areas of research are analytical toxicology (GC-MS, LC-MS) and metabolism of xenobiotics. He has published over 130 original papers and 20 invited reviews. He has received several scientific awards, including the Young Investigator Award of the Homburg Medical Faculty in 1983, the Irving Sunshine Award for Outstanding Contributions to Clinical Toxicology of the International Association of Therapeutic Drug Monitoring and Clinical Toxicology (IATDMCT) in 1997, the Alan Curry Lifetime Achievement Award of The International Association of Forensic Toxicologists (TIAFT) for Outstanding Contributions to Forensic Toxicology in 2003, and the Doctor Honoris causa title of the University of Ghent in 2007. He is the current President of IATDMCT (since 2007), Councillor of TIAFT (since 2005) and treasurer of GTFCh (since 1987).