Brandenberger, Jacques

Swiss chemist Jacques Brandenberger produces Cellophane (viscose cellulose... 

Cellophane (Jacques Edwin Brandenberger) Brandenberger builds a machine to mass-produce cellophane, which he has earlier synthesized while unsuccessfully attempting to develop a stain-resistant cloth. 

Charles F. Cross, Edward J. Bevan, and Clayton Beadle with the so-called viscose process using alkali and carbon disulfide, cellulose is reversibly converted into the xanthogenate (or xanthate) and thus rendered soluble (the gelatinous solution was called viscoid ), spun, and then transformed back into cellulose in an acid bath, and now called rayon [38]. But it wasn t until 1900, with the invention of modem spinning equipment by Charles F. Topham, that it became possible to create cellulose fibers commercially [39], Jacques E. Brandenberger succeeded in producing crystal clear films out of rayon in 1908 in Paris with a new type of machine he called the product cellophane - the first flexible, transparent, and waterproof packaging material - and patented the process in 1918 [40]. 

And then, in 1908, a remarkable new form of cellulose was developed by a Swiss chemist, Jacques Brandenberger, who conceived the idea of a stain-repellent fabric while watching red wine soak into a tablecloth in a restaurant. His efforts to coat linen with a cellulose film resulted only in a brittle sheet, but then he found that the coating could be peeled away from the cloth as a thin flexible transparent film. This became cellophane, first used as a humidor wrapping for cigars. The merits of its impermeability to moisture and contaminants soon became apparent, and it instantly made a huge impact on the food industry. The miraculous nature (as it appeared) of the material was even celebrated in one of Cole Porter s lyrics ... 

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