Paul Josef Jakob Gelmo (17 December 1879 – 22 October 1961) was an Austrian chemist who worked on

synthetic dyes A dye is a colored substance that chemically bonds to the substrate to which it is being applied. This distinguishes dyes from pigments which do not chemically bind to the material they color. Dye is generally applied in an aqueous solution and ...

and discovered

sulfanilamide Sulfanilamide (also spelled sulphanilamide) is a sulfonamide antibacterial drug. Chemically, it is an organic compound consisting of an aniline derivatized with a sulfonamide group. Powdered sulfanilamide was used by the Allies in World War II ...

in 1908, although their antibiotic properties were discovered only in 1932. Gelmo was born in Vienna and went to the Technische Hochschule where he received a diploma in 1903 and a doctorate in 1906. He then worked with Wilhelm Suida. During this period he examined

azo dye Azo dyes are organic compounds bearing the functional group R−N=N−R′, in which R and R′ are usually aryl and substituted aryl groups. They are a commercially important family of azo compounds, i.e. compounds containing the C-N=N ...

s and synthesized several compounds, including sulfanilamide for applications in dyeing. From 1910 he worked as chief chemist for the Austrian Printing Office, and in 1929 he became a lecturer in chemistry at the Technische Hochschule. In 1932 Gerhard Domagk found that the dye prontosil inhibited

streptococci ''Streptococcus'' is a genus of gram-positive ' (plural ) or spherical bacteria that belongs to the family Streptococcaceae, within the order Lactobacillales (lactic acid bacteria), in the phylum Bacillota. Cell division in streptococci occurs ...

and the active metabolite was identified as sulfonilamide, and it was the most cheaply produced antibacterial drug of its time.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Gelmo, Paul 1879 births 1961 deaths Austrian chemists TU Wien alumni Academic staff of TU Wien