János Irinyi (sometimes also spelled ''János Irínyi''; ; 18 May 1817 – 17 December 1895) was a Hungarian chemist and inventor of the noiseless and non-explosive

match A match is a tool for starting a fire. Typically, matches are made of small wooden sticks or stiff paper. One end is coated with a material that can be ignited by friction generated by striking the match against a suitable surface. Wooden matc ...

. He achieved this by mixing the yellow (also called white)

phosphorus Phosphorus is a chemical element with the symbol P and atomic number 15. Elemental phosphorus exists in two major forms, white phosphorus and red phosphorus, but because it is highly reactive, phosphorus is never found as a free element on Ear ...

with

lead dioxide Lead(IV) oxide is the inorganic compound with the formula PbO2. It is an oxide where lead is in an oxidation state of +4. It is a dark-brown solid which is insoluble in water. It exists in two crystalline forms. It has several important applicatio ...

instead of the potassium chlorate used previously.Hungarian Patent Office
this site's mention of calcium chlorate rather than potassium chlorate appears to be an error? Irinyi also took part in the

Hungarian Revolution of 1848 The Hungarian Revolution of 1848 or fully Hungarian Civic Revolution and War of Independence of 1848–1849 () was one of many European Revolutions of 1848 and was closely linked to other revolutions of 1848 in the Habsburg areas. Although t ...

Asteroid

Asteroid 106869 Irinyi, discovered by Hungarian astronomer

Krisztián Sárneczky Krisztián Sárneczky (born 6 November 1974 in Budapest) is a Hungarian people, Hungarian teacher of geography and prolific discoverer of minor planets and supernovae, researching at Konkoly Observatory in Budapest, Hungary. He is a board member o ...

and László L. Kiss at

Piszkéstető Station The Piszkéstető Station or Piszkéstető Mountain Station is an astronomical observatory in Mátraszentimre in Mátra Mountains, about northeast of Hungary's capital Budapest. It is a station of Konkoly Observatory, first built in 1958. It ...

in 2000, was named in his memory. The official was published by the Minor Planet Center on 22 January 2008 ().

References

External links

János Irinyi
1817 births 1895 deaths People from Bihor County Hungarian inventors Hungarian chemists {{chemist-stub