Hessel de Vries (November 15, 1916 in

Annen Annen is a village in the Dutch province of Drenthe. Located in the municipality of Aa en Hunze, it lies about 12 km (7.4 mi) northeast of Assen. History The village was first mentioned in 1309 as Anne. The etymology is unknown. Annen is an ...

– December 23, 1959 in

Groningen Groningen (; gos, Grunn or ) is the capital city and main municipality of Groningen province in the Netherlands. The ''capital of the north'', Groningen is the largest place as well as the economic and cultural centre of the northern part of t ...

), was a Dutch physicist and professor at the

University of Groningen The University of Groningen (abbreviated as UG; nl, Rijksuniversiteit Groningen, abbreviated as RUG) is a Public university#Continental Europe, public research university of more than 30,000 students in the city of Groningen (city), Groningen in ...

who furthered the detection methods and applications of

radiocarbon dating Radiocarbon dating (also referred to as carbon dating or carbon-14 dating) is a method for determining the age of an object containing organic material by using the properties of radiocarbon, a radioactive isotope of carbon. The method was dev ...

to a variety of sciences. The Nobel prize was awarded for in this field in 1960, however de Vries was not a contender, since the prize is not awarded posthumously and Hessel de Vries died in 1959 by committing suicide after murdering an analyst, Anneke Hoogeveen. He has been called "the unsung hero of radiocarbon dating" by Eric Willis, the first director of the radiocarbon-dating laboratory at the

University of Cambridge , mottoeng = Literal: From here, light and sacred draughts. Non literal: From this place, we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge. , established = , other_name = The Chancellor, Masters and Schola ...

. The 1960

Nobel Prize in Chemistry ) , image = Nobel Prize.png , alt = A golden medallion with an embossed image of a bearded man facing left in profile. To the left of the man is the text "ALFR•" then "NOBEL", and on the right, the text (smaller) "NAT•" then "M ...

was awarded to

Willard Libby Willard Frank Libby (December 17, 1908 – September 8, 1980) was an American physical chemist noted for his role in the 1949 development of radiocarbon dating, a process which revolutionized archaeology and palaeontology. For his contributions ...

for his radiocarbon-dating method. His other major area of research included studies of human color vision and hearing. De Vries became a member of the

Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences The Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences ( nl, Koninklijke Nederlandse Akademie van Wetenschappen, abbreviated: KNAW) is an organization dedicated to the advancement of science and literature in the Netherlands. The academy is housed ...

in 1956.

De Vries effect

In 1958, de Vries showed that baffling anomalies in the

carbon-14 Carbon-14, C-14, or radiocarbon, is a radioactive isotope of carbon with an atomic nucleus containing 6 protons and 8 neutrons. Its presence in organic materials is the basis of the radiocarbon dating method pioneered by Willard Libby and coll ...

dates, observed by

Willard Frank Libby Willard Frank Libby (December 17, 1908 – September 8, 1980) was an American physical chemist noted for his role in the 1949 development of radiocarbon dating, a process which revolutionized archaeology and palaeontology. For his contributio ...

for

Egyptological Egyptology (from ''Egypt'' and Greek , ''-logia''; ar, علم المصريات) is the study of ancient Egyptian history, language, literature, religion, architecture and art from the 5th millennium BC until the end of its native religious p ...

samples, were in fact systematic anomalies on a global scale, represented in the carbon-14 dates of

tree ring Dendrochronology (or tree-ring dating) is the scientific method of dating tree rings (also called growth rings) to the exact year they were formed. As well as dating them, this can give data for dendroclimatology, the study of climate and atmos ...

s. This phenomenon has been called the "de Vries effect". The correspondence with tree rings, which can be counted (one ring for each year), led to a recalibration of radiocarbon dating that was a large improvement in the accuracy.

Murder and suicide

De Vries committed suicide in 1959, after murdering a former analyst (Anneke Hoogeveen), with whom he was in love but who had become engaged to another man.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Vries, Hessel de 1916 births 1959 suicides People from Aa en Hunze 20th-century Dutch physicists University of Groningen faculty Murder in the Netherlands Members of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences 1959 murders in the Netherlands