Kolbe. Adolph

Kolbe, Adolph Wilhelm Hermann, 168, 196 Kossel, Walther, 74 Kroto, Harold, 96... 

Kolbe, Adolph Wilhelm Hermann (1818-84) German chemist who was the first to synthesize acetic acid from inorganic material. He discovered the Kolbe reaction in 1859, which allowed large-scale industrial synthesis of salicylic acid. This was important for the production of acetylsalicylic acid (aspirin). 

As the reaction is a coupling reaction, only alkanes with an even number of carbon atoms in the chain can be prepared in this way. The process is named for the German chemist Adolph Wilhelm Hermann Kolbe (1818-84). 

In 1845, for instance, Adolph Wilhelm Hermann Kolbe (1818-84), a pupil of Wohler s, succeeded in synthesizing acetic acid, an indubitably organic substance. Furthermore, he synthesized it by a method which showed that a clear line of chemical change could be drawn from the constituent elements, carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen, to the final product, acetic acid. This synthesis from the elements or total synthesis is all that can be asked of the chemist. If Wohler s synthesis of urea did not settle the matter of the vital force, Kolbe s synthesis of acetic acid did. 

Kekule was not the only important protagonist in the rise of the set of ideas that was ultimately consolidated under the rubric "structure theory" for example, in addition to Williamson, Adolphe Wurtz, Emil Erlenmeyer, Hermann Kolbe, and Edward Frankland also played vital roles. At the time of the birth of the theory all of these men occupied respected positions in their field. Chapter 5 looks at four outsiders— Archibald Couper, Joseph Loschmidt, Aleksandr Butlerov, and Alexander Crum Brown—who at this time were relatively new to the science, but who made their marks in sometimes transformative ways during the years 1858-64. All four had definite ideas on how molecules should be conceived by the scientist and best represented for heuristic purposes. A tour of these figures provides a fuller understanding of the range of responses, opportunities, and creative options that were available during these tumultuous years in the science, and suggests par-... 

Initially, even the simple 3D description of molecules was a controversial idea. In fact, Van t Hoff s 1874 book La chimie dans Vespace was ridiculed by such eminent chentists as Adolph Kolbe, the editor of the Journal fiir Praktische Chemie, who stated ... 

Advancement of Science. French scientist Louis Pasteur founds the science of stereochemistry (the study of the spatial arrangement of atoms in molecules and the effect of these arrangements on chemical properties). Scottish physician Sir James Simpson first uses chloroform as an anesthetic during experiments. English chemist Sir Edward Frankland and German chemist Adolph Kolbe discover ethane. Scottish physicist William Thomson, later Baron Kelvin, formulates the concept of absolute zero. 

Probably the most distinguished assembly of chemists in the history of science (8) could be found at the First International Chemical Congress which was held in Karsruhe in the Kingdom of Baden in 1860. Aside from Kekule, Liebig, Wohler, Bunsen and von Baeyer, there were also present Jean Baptiste Dumas, Hermann Kopp, Adolph Kolbe, Sir Edward Frankland, Dmitri Mendeleev, Friedrich Beilstein, Lothar Meyer and Charles Friedel, all of them "academically related." It was at this meeting that Stanislao Cannizzaro, a young Italian chemist who was working in Sardinia, and a former assistant of Michel Chevreul in Paris, burst in an... 

Professor Adolph Wilhelm Hermann Kolbe (1818-1884), University of Leipzig, Germany. Professor Rudolf Schmitt (1830-1898), University of Dresden, Germany. 

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