February in Chemistry

Today in Chemistry
On February 1st 1974, secret papers
were released, discussing the
manufacture of VX gas at the Chemical
Defence Experimental Establishment at
Porton Down, Wiltshire. VX gas is the
most powerful nerve gas known. Its
chemical name is ethyl-S-2-
diisopropylaminoethylmethyl-
phosphonothiolate.

Today in Chemistry
On February 2nd 1923,
leaded petrol was
first marketed in the
USA. Thomas Midgley
discovered that
adding lead tetraethyl
to petrol made it burn
much more smoothly.
About 25 years ago,
doctors noticed a link
between lead (from
leaded petrol) and brain damage in
young children. Most petrol sold today
is therefore unleaded. Midgley also
synthesised dichlorofluoroethane, the
first of the chlorofluorocarbons
(CFC’s), which are now known to damage
the ozone layer.

Today in Chemistry
On February 3rd 1893, Leonora Bilger,
was born. She was the first to
synthesise asymmetric nitrogen
compounds.

Today in Chemistry
Roy Plunkett of the chemical company
Du Pont patented Teflon on February
4th 1941. The real chemical name for
Teflon is poly(tetrafluoroethene) and it
is thought to be the most slippery
substance in the world. It is used to
coat non-stick frying pans.

Today in Chemistry
On February 5th 1840 the Scottish vet
John Dunlop, inventor of the pneumatic
tyre, was born. He sold the patent and
company name early on and as a result,
did not make as much money as he could
have done from his invention.

Today in Chemistry
In 1869, Mendeleev’s first Periodic
Table contained a few gaps. Not only
did Mendeleev forecast that these
missing elements would soon be
discovered, he boldly predicted what
properties they would have too.
Sure enough, on February 6th 1886, the
element germanium, Ge, was discovered
by Clemens
Winkler. It had
exactly the
properties that
Mendeleev
predicted. This
success led to the
rapid acceptance of the Periodic Table
by other scientists.

Today in Chemistry
On February 7th 1834 Dmitri
Mendeleev, was born. He formulated
the Periodic Table in 1869.

Today in Chemistry
On February 8th 1777 Bernard Courtois,
was born. He discovered the element
iodine, I, by extracting it from
seaweed.

Today in Chemistry
On February 9th 1950 the element
californium, Cf (atomic number = 98)
was discovered. Glenn Seaborg and co-
workers used ion-exchange
chromatography at the University of
California.

Today in Chemistry
The Swedish chemist and geologist Per
Teodor Cleve was born on February 10th
1840. He discovered the elements
holmium and thulium.

Today in Chemistry
London University was founded on
February 11th 1836, although its two
main colleges, KCL and UCL both
predate the university by a few years.

Today in Chemistry
On February 12th 1957, GEC, the
General Electric Company announced
that it had made borazon, a material
hard enough to scratch diamonds.
Borazon is actually the compound boron
nitride. The hardness of diamond and
borazon is approximately equal, each
able to scratch the
other. Boron nitride is
used for abrasive
tools in the mining
industry.

Today in Chemistry
Perhaps the most famous ‘accidental
discovery’ occurred when Alexander
Fleming noticed that something was
killing bacteria on one of his petri
dishes. He reported his initial findings
on ‘Cultures of Penicillium’ to the
Medical Research Club, London on
February 13th 1929.

Today in Chemistry
On February 14th 1961, the element
lawrencium, Lr (atomic number 103) was
first produced at the University of
California in the USA.

Today in Chemistry
On February 15th 1826 the Irish
chemist George Stoney was born. He
was the first person to coin the term
electron (atom of electricity).

Today in Chemistry
On February 16th 1955 General Electric
Research Laboratories announced that
they had produced the world’s first
synthetic diamond.

Today in Chemistry
The Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament
(CND) was formed on February 17th
1958. Philosopher Bertrand Russell,
politician Michael Foot and writer J.B.
Priestly were among those present at
the initial meeting at Westminster
Central Hall.

Today in Chemistry
On February 18th 1913, the word isotope
was first used by Frederick Soddy to
describe
atoms with
the same
number of
protons but
different
numbers of
neutrons.

Today in Chemistry
On February
19th 1859,
Svante
Arrhenius was
born. He
worked on
reaction rates,
viscosity,
electrolytes
and even
discovered the
Greenhouse
Effect! The
Arrhenius equation and constant for
rates of reaction are named after him
and he won the Nobel Prize for
Chemistry in 1903.

Today in Chemistry
On February 20th1844 Ludwig
Boltzmann was born. He came up some
of the deepest and most profound ideas
in thermodynamics (e.g. the second law)
and practically invented the field of
statistical
mechanics.
The Boltzman
constant and
the Maxwell-
Boltzmann
distribution of
molecular
speeds are
named after
him.

Today in Chemistry
On February 21st 1947, Edwin Land
demonstrated his new invention, the
Polaroid Camera, for the first time.

Today in Chemistry
On February
22nd 1879
Johannes
Bronsted, was
born. He did
research on
catalysis,
rates of
reactions and
ions but is
best
remembered
for his theory
of acids and bases. According to the
Bronsted-Lowry definition, an acid is a
proton donor.

Today in Chemistry
The first meeting of the Chemical
Society of London (now the Royal
Society of Chemistry) took place on
23rd February 1841.

Today in Chemistry
Only a few atoms of element 107,
bohrium, have ever been made. The
first atoms were made through a
nuclear reaction involving fusion of an
isotope of lead, with one of chromium
on February 24th 1981,
209 54 262
Pb + Cr Bh + 1n
Isolation of an observable quantity of
bohrium has never been achieved, and
may well never be. This is because
bohrium decays very rapidly through
the emission of a-particles.

Today in Chemistry
On February 25th 1896 Ida Noddack,
co-discoverer of the element rhenium,
Re (atomic number = 75) was born.

Today in Chemistry
The Italian
polymer chemist
Giulio Natta was
born on February
26th 1903. The
Ziegler-Natta
catalyst, which
speeds up
polymerisation
reactions, is
named after him.
He shared the
Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 1963 with
Karl Ziegler.

Today in Chemistry
On February 27th 1932 a letter entitled
‘Possible Existence of the Neutron’ by
James Chadwick appeared in Nature.
Chadwick was awarded the Nobel Prize
for Physics in
1935 for
discovering the
neutron.

Today in Chemistry
The American
chemist Linus
Pauling was born on
February 28th
1901. He worked
on molecular
structure, bonding,
valency, and
resonance and
published an
important
textbook called The Nature of the
Chemical Bond. He won the Nobel Prize
for Chemistry in 1954 and the Nobel
Peace Prize in 1962 after campaigning
for nuclear disarmament.

February in Chemistry
Written and compiled by
Anthony Hardwicke
Thanks to Nigel Freestone,
Northampton University
Acknowledgements for Pictures
1, 2, 4, 16, 20, 22
www.SciencePhoto.com
13, 17, 21 www.ScienceandSociety.co.uk
12 www.JIUnlimited.com
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