Carl Alfred Osann

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Carl Alfred Osann , called Alfred Osann, (born December 3, 1859 , Hofheim in Lower Franconia ; † August 6, 1923 in Freiburg im Breisgau ) was a German mineralogist and petrograph .

life and work

Osann was the son of the district court doctor in Hof (and later district court doctor in Munich) Friedrich Osann, his grandfather was the physicist and chemist Gottfried Osann . The family lived in Würzburg from 1867 (in the house of the late grandfather, who had been a professor there), where he attended secondary school with the Abitur in 1877. He then studied chemistry, mineralogy and physics at the University of Heidelberg , among others with Robert Wilhelm Bunsen (Chemistry), Hermann Kopp (chemistry), Harry Rosenbusch (mineralogy), Georg Hermann Quincke (physics). In 1881 he received his doctorate in chemistry (without a dissertation, at that time only an examination was required) with mineralogy and physics as a minor. He then studied in 1883/84 at the University of Strasbourg with Ernst Wilhelm Benecke and undertook geological field work in the Vosges . From 1884 he was an assistant at the Mineralogical-Geological Institute of the University of Heidelberg, where he completed his habilitation in 1887 ( contribution to the knowledge of the Labrador porphyries of the Vosges ) and became a private lecturer.

In 1891 he became an associate professor in Heidelberg. He was a close colleague of Rosenbusch there. From 1893 to 1895 he was at the invitation of the local geological office in Texas, where he carried out field research and evaluated its collection, which he then worked in Karlsruhe (as a provisional substitute for the deceased director of the mineral cabinet Adolph Knop ) and Munich (with Paul Heinrich von Groth ) continued.

In 1897 he became professor of mineralogy at the Chemistry School in Mulhouse and in 1898 he was also a private lecturer and from 1900 an associate professor at the University of Basel . From 1903 he was an associate professor, from 1904 a full honorary professor and from 1906 a full professor of mineralogy, crystallography and petrography at the Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg (inaugural lecture 1904 nephrite and its prehistoric importance ). There he was director of the Mineralogical Institute and from 1917 Privy Councilor. In 1909 he was elected an extraordinary member of the Heidelberg Academy of Sciences .

Osann undertook extensive research trips, in particular to Spain (1887 to 1890), Portugal and the United States ( Texas , 1893–1895) by means of which he amassed an important igneous rock collection. It was considered the most important of its kind until the middle of the 20th century and comprised 5,000 specimens and 3,000 thin sections. He discovered the mineral Holmquisit and described seven new rock types ( Apachit , Jumillit , Katzenbuckelit , Malchit , Paisanit , Pedrosit and Verit ). He developed his own chemical-mineralogical classification of igneous rocks, which was used until the middle of the 20th century.

He lived with his mother for a long time (which is why he turned down a call to the Canadian geological service) and only married his assistant, the mathematician Gertraud Siehl, in 1920. She posthumously released his minerals from Baden .

Fonts

  • Contributions to the knowledge of the igneous rocks of Cabo de Gata (Prov. Almeria) , journal of the German Geological Society, 1889, Berlin. Volume 41, pp. 297-311 - first description by Verit
  • About dioritic rock in the Odenwald , reports from the Grossherzoglich Badische Landesanstalt, 1892. Heidelberg. Volume 2, pp. 380-388 - First description of malchite
  • Report on the rocks of Trans-Pecos Texas , Report of the Geological Survey of Texas. Austin, 1893, Volume 4, pp. 123-138 - First description of paisanite
  • Contributions to the geology and petrography of the Apache (Davis) Mts, Westtexas , Tschermaks Mineralogische und Petrographische Mitteilungen, Vienna, 1896. Volume 15, second series, pp. 394–456 - first description of Apachit
  • Attempt of a chemical classification of igneous rocks , Tschermaks Mineralogische und Petrographische Mitteilungen, Vienna. Volume 19, 1900, pp. 351-469, Volume 20, 1901, pp. 399-558, Volume 21, 1902, pp. 365-448, Volume 22, 1903, pp. 322-356, pp. 403-436 - First description of Katzenbuckelit in Volume 21
  • About some alkaline stones from Spain , in EA Wülfing (editor): Festschrift Harry Rosenbusch, Schweizerbart, Stuttgart, 1906, pp. 263-310 - first description by Jumillit
  • Petrochemistry of igneous rocks , in Handwortbuch der Naturwissenschaften , Volume 7, 1912, pp. 596–605
  • Petrochemical investigations , Dep. D. Heidelberg Akad. D. Knowledge Math.-natural science Kl., 1913, pp. 1-163
  • The chemical factor in a natural classification of eruptive stones , Abh. Heidelberger Akad. Wiss., 1919, pp. 1–126, 1920, pp. 1–5
  • with Harry Rosenbusch : Elements of the rock theory , Schweizerbart, Stuttgart, 1922, fourth edition, p. 779 (revision by Osann) - first description of Pedrosit
  • The minerals of Baden , Swiss beard 1927

Honors

The mineral, named after him as osannite , turned out to be identical to the already known riebeckite in later investigations .

Web links

  • Alexander Kipnis: Osann, Alfred Carl. In: Baden biographies. New episode 6 (2011), pp. 298-301. LEO-BW, Baden-Württemberg State Archive, accessed on February 22, 2018 .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Treatises on the special geological map of Alsace-Lorraine, Vol. 3, Issue 2, 1887, pp. 1-4
  2. ^ Members of the HAdW since it was founded in 1909. Alfred Osann. Heidelberg Academy of Sciences, accessed on June 18, 2016 .
  3. ↑ Osannit on mindat.org
personal data
SURNAME Osann, Carl Alfred
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Osann, Alfred
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German mineralogist and petrologist
DATE OF BIRTH December 3, 1859
PLACE OF BIRTH Hofheim in Lower Franconia
DATE OF DEATH August 6, 1923
Place of death Freiburg in Breisgau