This Week in Chemistry: May 26 - June 1

May 26, 2008 at 01:36 AM

Analtech, Inc. is proud to provide this public service feature - This Week in Chemistry - a recap of major breakthroughs in chemistry as well as the commemoration of key individuals birthdates.

Analtech thanks Dr. Leopold May of The Catholic University of America forproviding this information - you can visit his web site by clicking here.

May 26

b. 1865 Max Julius Louis Le Blanc, research on electrochemical polarization and electrodes; introduced the hydrogen electrode.

b. 1895 Helen Marie Dyer, who did research on chemotherapy, was born on this day. She received an award from ACS in recognition of distinguished service by a female. She was the oldest member of CSW when she died at the age of 103.


May 27

b. 1840 Lars F. Nilson discovered scandium (Sc, 21), 1879.

b. 1857 Theodor Curtius, researcher in chemistry of hydrazines and azides; Curtius rearrangement; characterized benzoylglycylglycine.

b. 1904 John C. Bailar, Jr., discovered optical inversion & explained stereospecificity in complex inorganic reactions 

b. 1909 Mary Fieser researcher on quinones, natural products, and steroids; coauthored texts in organic chemistry with her husband.


May 28

b. 1887 Kasmir Fajans established radioactive displacement law & initiated concept of heat of hydration of gaseous ions. 


May 29

b. 1781 Henri Braconnot, isolated glucose from plant material such as sawdust, linen or bark by boiling in acid; prepared “xyloidine”, a precursor for plastics, by treating starch, sawdust, and cotton with nitric acid.

b. 1794 Antoine A. B. Bussy isolated magnesium (Mg, 12), 1828.

o General Electric Corp. announced synthesis of gem-grade diamonds, 1970.


May 30

b. 1912 Julius Axelrod, researcher on catecholamines; Nobel Prize in Medicine or Physiology (1970) with B. Katz and U. Von Euler for discoveries concerning humoral transmittors in the nerve terminals and the mechanism for their storage, release and inactivation.

b. 1915 Henry A. Hill, founded National Polychemicals and Riverside Research Laboratories; first African American president (1977) of the American Chemical Society.

o William Ramsay and Morris W. Travers, discovered krypton (Kr, 36), 1898.


May 31

b. 1941 Louis J. Ignarro shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (1998) with Robert F. Furchgott and Ferid Murad for their discoveries concerning nitric oxide as a signaling molecule in the cardiovascular system.


June 1

b. 1907 Frank Whittle designed and patented a jet aircraft engine. Hans von Ohain and Sir Frank Whittle are both recognized as being the co-inventors of the jet engine.

b.1917 William Knowles, shared Nobel Prize (2001) with Ryoji Noyori  for their work on chirally catalysed hydrogenation reactions and K. Barry Sharpless for his work on chirally catalysed oxidation reactions. 

o  The paper “Electric Moments of Molecules in Liquids” by Lars Onsager, published in the Journal of the American Chemical Society (1936: 58, 1486-1493), was received on this day, 1936.