RusPortraits v2-193 Le Comte Apollos Apollosowitch Moussine-Pouchkine

Count Apollos Apollosovich Musin-Pushkin (russian: Аполло́с Аполло́сович Му́син-Пу́шкин; February 17, 1760 – April 18, 1805) was a

Russian Russian(s) refers to anything related to Russia, including: *Russians (, ''russkiye''), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *Rossiyane (), Russian language term for all citizens and peo ...

chemist A chemist (from Greek ''chēm(ía)'' alchemy; replacing ''chymist'' from Medieval Latin ''alchemist'') is a scientist trained in the study of chemistry. Chemists study the composition of matter and its properties. Chemists carefully describe th ...

and plant collector. He led a botanical expedition to the

Caucasus The Caucasus () or Caucasia (), is a region between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea, mainly comprising Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, and parts of Southern Russia. The Caucasus Mountains, including the Greater Caucasus range, have historically ...

in 1802 with his friend botanist

Friedrich August Marschall von Bieberstein Baron Friedrich August Marschall von Bieberstein (30 July 1768 in Stuttgart – 28 June 1826 in Merefa) was an early explorer of the flora and archeology of the southern portion of Imperial Russia, including the Caucasus and Novorossiya. He compi ...

. In 1797, he was elected a foreign member of the

Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences ( sv, Kungliga Vetenskapsakademien) is one of the Swedish Royal Academies, royal academies of Sweden. Founded on 2 June 1739, it is an independent, non-governmental scientific organization that takes special ...

. He was a member of the Russian mining board and developed several new methods of

refining {{Unreferenced, date=December 2009 Refining (also perhaps called by the mathematical term affining) is the process of purification of a (1) substance or a (2) form. The term is usually used of a natural resource that is almost in a usable form, b ...

and processing of

platinum Platinum is a chemical element with the symbol Pt and atomic number 78. It is a dense, malleable, ductile, highly unreactive, precious, silverish-white transition metal. Its name originates from Spanish , a diminutive of "silver". Platinu ...

. The genus of

Puschkinia ''Puschkinia'' is a genus of four known species of bulbous perennial plant, perennials in the family (biology), family Asparagaceae, subfamily Scilloideae. It is native to the Caucasus and the Middle East. ''Puschkinia scilloides'' is grown as an ...

commemorates his name.

References

1760 births 1805 deaths Chemists from the Russian Empire Russian nobility 18th-century botanists from the Russian Empire Russian inventors Members of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences Honorary members of the Saint Petersburg Academy of Sciences Fellows of the Royal Society {{Russia-chemist-stub