Prof Friedrich Stromeyer FRS(For)

FRSE Fellowship of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (FRSE) is an award granted to individuals that the Royal Society of Edinburgh, Scotland's national academy of science and letters, judged to be "eminently distinguished in their subject". This soci ...

(2 August 1776 – 18 August 1835) was a German

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 ...

. He was the discoverer of

cadmium Cadmium is a chemical element with the symbol Cd and atomic number 48. This soft, silvery-white metal is chemically similar to the two other stable metals in group 12, zinc and mercury. Like zinc, it demonstrates oxidation state +2 in most of ...

. From 1982 a Friedrich Stromeyer Prize has been awarded for chemical achievement in Germany.

Life

He was born in

Göttingen Göttingen (, , ; nds, Chöttingen) is a college town, university city in Lower Saxony, central Germany, the Capital (political), capital of Göttingen (district), the eponymous district. The River Leine runs through it. At the end of 2019, t ...

on 2 August 1776 the eldest son of Dr Ernerst Johann Friedrich Stromeyer, professor of medicine at

Göttingen University Göttingen (, , ; nds, Chöttingen) is a university city in Lower Saxony, central Germany, the capital of the eponymous district. The River Leine runs through it. At the end of 2019, the population was 118,911. General information The orig ...

, and his wife, Marie Magdalena Johanne von Blum. Stromeyer studied Chemistry and Medicine at Göttingen and

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

and received an MD degree from the

University of Göttingen The University of Göttingen, officially the Georg August University of Göttingen, (german: Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, known informally as Georgia Augusta) is a public research university in the city of Göttingen, Germany. Founded ...

in 1800, studying under

Johann Friedrich Gmelin , fields = , workplaces = University of GöttingenUniversity of Tübingen , alma_mater = University of Tübingen , doctoral_advisor = Philipp Friedrich GmelinFerdinand Christoph Oetinger , academic_advisors = , doctora ...

and

Louis Nicolas Vauquelin Prof. Louis Nicolas Vauquelin Royal Society of London, FRS(For) HFRSE (16 May 1763 – 14 November 1829) was a French pharmacist and chemist. He was the discoverer of both chromium and beryllium. Early life Vauquelin was born at Saint-André-d'H ...

. He was then a professor at the university, and also served as an inspector of apothecaries. His students included

Robert Bunsen Robert Wilhelm Eberhard Bunsen (; 30 March 1811 – 16 August 1899) was a German chemist. He investigated emission spectra of heated elements, and discovered caesium (in 1860) and rubidium (in 1861) with the physicist Gustav Kirchhoff. The Bu ...

. In 1817, whilst studying compounds of

zinc Zinc is a chemical element with the symbol Zn and atomic number 30. Zinc is a slightly brittle metal at room temperature and has a shiny-greyish appearance when oxidation is removed. It is the first element in group 12 (IIB) of the periodi ...

carbonate, Stromeyer discovered the element

. Cadmium is a common impurity of

compounds, though often found only in minute quantities. He was also the first to recommend starch as a reagent for free

iodine Iodine is a chemical element with the symbol I and atomic number 53. The heaviest of the stable halogens, it exists as a semi-lustrous, non-metallic solid at standard conditions that melts to form a deep violet liquid at , and boils to a vi ...

and he studied chemistry of

arsine Arsine (IUPAC name: arsane) is an inorganic compound with the formula As H3. This flammable, pyrophoric, and highly toxic pnictogen hydride gas is one of the simplest compounds of arsenic. Despite its lethality, it finds some applications in ...

and

bismuthate Bismuthate is an ion. Its chemical formula is BiO3−. It has bismuth in its +5 oxidation state. It is a very strong oxidizing agent. It reacts with hot water to make bismuth(III) oxide and oxygen. It also reacts with acids. Sodium bismuthate is t ...

salts. In 1819 he was the first scientist to describe the mineral

eudialyte Eudialyte, whose name derives from the Greek phrase , , meaning "well decomposable", is a somewhat rare, nine member ring cyclosilicate mineral, which forms in alkaline igneous rocks, such as nepheline syenites. Its name alludes to its ready ...

. In 1826 he was elected a Fellow of the

Royal Society of Edinburgh The Royal Society of Edinburgh is Scotland's national academy of science and letters. It is a registered charity that operates on a wholly independent and non-partisan basis and provides public benefit throughout Scotland. It was established i ...

his proposer being Edward Turner. As his fellowship was Ordinary (rather than Foreign or Honorary) this means he was physically present in

Edinburgh Edinburgh ( ; gd, Dùn Èideann ) is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. Historically part of the county of Midlothian (interchangeably Edinburghshire before 1921), it is located in Lothian ...

at that time. The following year he was elected a Foreign Fellow of the

Royal Society of London The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, re ...

. In 1832 the mineral stromeyerite was named in his honour by mineralogist

François Sulpice Beudant François Sulpice Beudant (5 September 1787 – 10 December 1850), was a French mineralogist and geologist. The mineral beudantite was named after him. Life He was born in Paris. He was educated at the Ecole Polytechnique and Ecole Normale, an ...

. He died in Göttingen on 18 August 1835 aged 59.

References

* Lockemann, Georg; Oesper, Ralph E. ''Friedrich Stromeyer and the history of chemical laboratory instruction'', ''J. Chem. Educ.'' 1953, 30, pp. 202–204. * I. Asimov, ''Asimov's Biographical Encyclopedia of Science and Technology'' (2nd Ed.), Doubleday, 1982, pp. 276–277. * M.E. Weeks, ''Discovery of the Elements'' (7th Ed.), Leicester, H. M., Ed., ''J. Chem. Educ.,'' 1968, pp. 502–508. * J. R. Partington, ''A History of Chemistry,'' Macmillan, 1962, ''vol. 3'', pp. 659–660. * ''Biographisches Lexikon der hervorragenden Ärzte,'' Urban & Schwarzenberg, 1962, vol. 5, p. 566.

External links

* 1776 births 1835 deaths 19th-century German chemists Discoverers of chemical elements University of Göttingen alumni Foreign Members of the Royal Society Cadmium {{Germany-chemist-stub