Smithson Tennant
Smithson Tennant (born November 30, 1761 in Selby , North Yorkshire , England , † February 22, 1815 in Boulogne-sur-Mer ) was an English chemist .
Life
Tennant was a pastor's son and lost both parents at an early age. From 1781 he studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh , then from 1783 chemistry, mathematics and botany at Cambridge (Christ's College). In 1788 he received his bachelor's degree and in 1796 he received his doctorate in medicine. He made frequent trips to Denmark, Sweden, France and the Netherlands, lived in London from 1793 and then on his estate in Somerset near Cheddar , where he also gave courses in mineralogy. In 1813 he was appointed professor of chemistry at Cambridge. Tennant was killed in a riding accident.
Together with his friend William Hyde Wollaston, he demonstrated that diamond is pure carbon. He succeeded in doing this by oxidizing the same masses of coal and diamond and the only product he received was the same mass of CO 2 .
In 1804 he discovered iridium and osmium as impurities in platinum (the insoluble residues when dissolved with aqua regia ). Wollaston had previously discovered palladium and rhodium in platinum ore in 1803. He also built on the work of Antoine François de Fourcroy and his student Louis-Nicolas Vauquelin and Hippolyte Victor Collet-Descotils , who were also on the trail of new elements in platinum ores.
In 1799 he found that dolomite differs from limestone in its magnesium content.
The mineral tennantite is named after him. He was a Fellow of the Royal Society and received its Copley Medal .
literature
- Winfried Pötsch u. a. Lexicon of important chemists , Harri Deutsch 1989
Web links
- Smithson Tennant , entry in the Encyclopædia Britannica 1911 (English)
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Tennant, Smithson |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | English chemist |
| DATE OF BIRTH | November 30, 1761 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Selby in North Yorkshire |
| DATE OF DEATH | February 22, 1815 |
| Place of death | Boulogne |