Week 13

Week 13: March 26 – April 1 (Archive)

March 26

  • Benjamin Thompson (count Rumford), born 1753, invented simple photometer; researched heat; demonstrated second law of thermodynamics; improved cooking and heating systems; improved animal breeding.
  • A. Crum Brown, born 1838, devised modern structural formulae (1864); formulated rules for substitution in benzene derivatives; researched theory of isomerism and organic compound of sulfur.
  • James B. Conant, born 1893, researcher on free radicals, hemoglobin, and chlorophylls.
  • Ferdinand G. Brickwedde, born 1903, codiscovered deuterium (1932).
  • Bernard Katz, born 1911, Nobel Prize in Medicine (1970).
  • Christian B. Anfinsen, born 1916, Nobel Prize in Chemistry (1972).

March 27

  • Johann W. Hittorf, born 1824, researched electrolysis of salt solutions, transport numbers, ion migrations, and electrical discharges in gases.
  • Wilhelm C. Röntgen, born 1845, researched specific heats and heat conduction in crystals; discovered X-rays (1895); Nobel Prize in Physics (1901).
  • Otto Wallach, born 1847, researcher on essential oils and terpenes; Nobel Prize in Chemistry (1910).

March 28

  • George C. Pond, born 1861, chemistry teacher; preserver of Priestley home in Pennsylvania.
  • Glenn T. Seaborg, et al. demonstrated that plutonium 239 undergoes fission by slow neutrons in 1941.

March 29

  • Frederick Accum, born 1769, help found the coal gas industry; wrote on food adulteration.
  • Konrad J. Bredt, born 1855, described first correct structure of camphor; introduced Bredt's rule for bicyclic compounds.
  • Aleksi E. Chichibabin, born 1871, researched nucleophilic alkylation and the amination of pyridine.
  • Donald D. Van Slyke, born 1883, pioneer in clinical chemistry.
  • Herrick L. Johnson, born 1898, researcher of low temperature.

March 30

  • Crawford W. Long was first to use ether as an anesthetic on a patient in 1842.

March 31

  • Thomas Clark, born 1801, authority on water purification; introduced use of calcium hydroxide for softening of water.
  • Robert Bunsen, born 1811, co invented spectroscope (1859), galvanic battery, Bunsen burner, filter pump, and actinometer; in 1860, discovered cesium (Cs,55); in 1861, discovered rubidium (Rb,37).
  • Archibald Scott Couper, born 1831, developed organic structural theory (at the same time as F. A. KekulÉ); first to use bond lines for organic structures.
  • W. Lawrence Bragg, born 1890, researcher in X-rays and crystal structures; Nobel Prize in Physics (1915).

April 1

  • Sergei N. Reformatsky, born 1860, synthesized organozinc halides (Reformatsky reaction).
  • Richard A. Zsigmondy, born 1865, elucidator of heterogeneous nature of colloidal solutions; Nobel Prize in Chemistry (1925); introduced ultramicroscope for study of colloidal solutions.
  • Julian Stone reported in Applied Physics Letters on new type of fiber made of quartz and filled with tetrachlorethylene that may be able to carry light in 1972 .