Anton Köllisch (16 March 1888 – September 1916) was a German chemist who, whilst working at

Darmstadt Darmstadt () is a city in the States of Germany, state of Hesse in Germany, located in the southern part of the Frankfurt Rhine Main Area, Rhine-Main-Area (Frankfurt Metropolitan Region). Darmstadt has around 160,000 inhabitants, making it th ...

for pharmaceutical giant

Merck Merck refers primarily to the German Merck family and three companies founded by the family, including: * the Merck Group, a German chemical, pharmaceutical and life sciences company founded in 1668 ** Merck Serono (known as EMD Serono in the Unite ...

, first described the synthesis of the chemical

MDMA 3,4-Methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA), commonly seen in Tablet (pharmacy), tablet form (ecstasy) and crystal form (molly or mandy), is a potent empathogen–entactogen with stimulant properties primarily used for Recreational dru ...

Life and work

In 1911, Köllisch published his doctoral dissertation on the topic of

indole Indole is an aromatic heterocyclic organic compound with the formula C8 H7 N. It has a bicyclic structure, consisting of a six-membered benzene ring fused to a five-membered pyrrole ring. Indole is widely distributed in the natural environmen ...

synthesis from

hydrazone Hydrazones are a class of organic compounds with the structure . They are related to ketones and aldehydes by the replacement of the oxygen =O with the = functional group. They are formed usually by the action of hydrazine on ketones or aldehydes. ...

s under

Otto Diels Otto Paul Hermann Diels (; 23 January 1876 – 7 March 1954) was a German chemist. His most notable work was done with Kurt Alder on the Diels–Alder reaction, a method for diene synthesis. The pair was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry ...

at the

University of Berlin Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (german: Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, abbreviated HU Berlin) is a German public research university in the central borough of Mitte in Berlin. It was established by Frederick William III on the initiative o ...

. While at Merck, Dr Köllisch was involved in investigating syntheses for methylhydrastinine and

hydrastinine Hydrastinine is a semisynthetic alkaloid from the hydrolysis of the alkaloid hydrastine, which was found naturally in small quantities in '' Hydrastis canadensis'' L. (Ranunculaceae). Hydrastinine was produced by oxidative splitting of hydrastin ...

. A procedural patent was filed on

Christmas Eve Christmas Eve is the evening or entire day before Christmas Day, the festival commemorating the birth of Jesus. Christmas Day is observed around the world, and Christmas Eve is widely observed as a full or partial holiday in anticipation ...

1912 relating to these syntheses, which mentioned MDMA without name as a chemical intermediate. He was killed in the

First World War World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

References

Bibliography

* Germany, Kaiserliches Patentamt, Patentschrift Nr 274350, http://mdma.net/merck/mdma-patent1.html * * Adam, David.
Truth about ecstasy's unlikely trip from lab to dance floor
Pharmaceutical company unravels drug's chequered past'',

Guardian Unlimited TheGuardian.com, formerly known as Guardian.co.uk and ''Guardian Unlimited'', is a British news and media website owned by the Guardian Media Group. It contains nearly all of the content of the newspapers ''The Guardian'' and ''The Observer'', ...

, 2006-08-18. * {{DEFAULTSORT:Kollisch, Anton 1888 births 20th-century German chemists 1916 deaths German military personnel killed in World War I Scientists from Darmstadt