Johann Wolfgang Döbereiner

Johann Wolfgang Döbereiner
Johann Wolfgang Döbereiner
Born (1780-12-13)13 December 1780
Hof, Principality of Bayreuth
Died 24 March 1849(1849-03-24) (aged 68)
Jena, Grand Duchy of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach
Nationality German
Known for Döbereiner's triads
Döbereiner's lamp
Scientific career
Fields Chemistry
Institutions University of Jena

Johann Wolfgang Döbereiner (13 December 1780 – 24 March 1849) was a German chemist who is best known for work that foreshadowed the periodic law for the chemical elements and inventing the first lighter, which was known as the Döbereiner's lamp.[1] He became a professor of chemistry and pharmacy at the University of Jena.

Life and work

As a coachman's son, Döbereiner had little opportunity for formal schooling. So he was apprenticed to an apothecary, reading widely and attending science lectures. He eventually became a professor at the University of Jena in 1810; he also studied chemistry at Strasbourg. In work published in 1829,[2] Döbereiner reported trends in certain properties of selected groups of elements. For example, the average atomic mass of lithium and potassium was close to the atomic mass of sodium. A similar pattern was found with calcium, strontium, and barium, with sulfur, selenium, and tellurium, and also with chlorine, bromine, and iodine. Moreover, the densities for some of these triads followed a similar pattern. These sets of elements became known as "Döbereiner's triads".[3][4]

Döbereiner's lamp

Döbereiner also is known for his discovery of furfural,[5] for his work on the use of platinum as a catalyst, and for a lighter, known as Döbereiner's lamp. By 1828 hundreds of thousands of these lighters had been mass produced by the German manufacturer Gottfried Piegler in Schleiz.[6]

The German writer Goethe was a friend of Döbereiner, attended his lectures weekly, and used his theories of chemical affinities as a basis for his famous 1809 novella Elective Affinities.

Works

References

  1. ↑ "Treasures: Table lighters ignite interest in collectors". Independent.ie. 2016-11-11. Retrieved 2017-01-27.
  2. ↑ Döbereiner, Johann Wolfgang (1829). "An Attempt to Group Elementary Substances according to Their Analogies". Annalen der Physik und Chemie. 15: 301&ndash, 307. an attempt which I made twelve years ago to group substances by their analogies.
  3. ↑ "Johann Wolfgang Dobereiner". Archived from the original on 2016-03-23. Retrieved 2016-03-23.
  4. ↑ "A Historic Overview: Mendeleev and the Periodic Table" (PDF). Retrieved 2008-03-08.
  5. ↑ J. W. Döbereiner (1832). "Ueber die medicinische und chemische Anwendung und die vortheilhafte Darstellung der Ameisensäure". Berichte der deutschen chemischen Gesellschaft. 3 (2): 141–146. doi:10.1002/jlac.18320030206.
  6. ↑ Thomas, John Meurig (2017). "The RSC Faraday prize lecture of 1989". Chemical Communications. 53: 9185–9197.

Further reading

  • Collins, P. M. D. (1986). "The Pivotal Role of Platinum in the Discovery of Catalysis" (PDF). Platinum Metals Review. 30 (3): 141–146.
  • Döbereiner, Johann Wolfgang (1829). "An Attempt to Group Elementary Substances according to Their Analogies". Annalen der Physik und Chemie. 15: 301&ndash, 307. ff
  • Hoffmann, Roald (Jul–Aug 1998). "Döbereiner's Lighter". American Scientist. 86 (4): 326. doi:10.1511/1998.4.326.
  • Hoffmann, Roald (1998). "Döbereiner's Lighter". American Scientist. 86 (4): 326. doi:10.1511/1998.4.326. Archived from the original on March 24, 2006.
  • Kauffman, George B. (1999). "Johann Wolfgang Döbereiner's Feuerzeug". Platinum Metals Review. 43 (3).
  • Kaufmann, George (1999). "From Triads to Catalysis: Johann Wolfgang Döbereiner (1780–1849) on the 150th Anniversary of His Death". The Chemical Educator. 4 (5): 186–197. doi:10.1007/s00897990326a.
  • McDonald, Donald (1965). "Johann Wolfgang Döbereiner" (PDF). Platinum Metals Review. 9 (4): 136–139.
  • Prandtl, Wilhelm (1950). "Johann Wolfgang Dobereiner, Goethe's Chemical Adviser". Journal of Chemical Education. 27 (4): 176&ndash, 181. Bibcode:1950JChEd..27..176P. doi:10.1021/ed027p176.
  • Kimberley A. McGrath, Bridget Travers. 1999. World of Scientific Discovery. Gale Research.


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