Isaac Lifschütz
Isaac Lifschütz (born March 15, 1852 in Pinsk , Minsk Gouvernement , Russian Empire , today Belarus ; † February 6, 1938 in Hamburg ) was a German chemist and discoverer of Eucerit , the basis of one of the very first skin creams.
life and work
Isaac Lifschütz was of Jewish origin and studied from 1870 first in Switzerland and then at the University of Friborg . Here he received his doctorate in 1884 with a thesis entitled On the effect of concentrated sulfuric acid on nitroanthraquinones .
From 1885 Lifschütz worked in the laboratory of the glycerine and lanolin factory Benno Jaffé & Darmstaedter in Berlin-Pankow . From 1896 there were publications on the chemistry of wool fat ; this is how Lifschütz and Ludwig Darmstädter found carnaubyl alcohol (C 24 H 50 O). In 1898 Lifschütz finally isolated the Eucerit from wool fat (patent 1902). Lifschütz held a total of 20 patents.
Not successful enough with his own company, Lifschütz came to the Beiersdorf company in Hamburg in 1911 through the entrepreneur Oscar Troplowitz and the dermatologist Paul Gerson Unna . Here, Eucerit, in the form of the “water-in-oil emulsion ” Eucerin, became the basic ingredient for the Nivea skin cream and thus essential for the rise of Beiersdorf.
Lifschütz's formal influence in the company remained limited: in 1920 he was refused a seat on the supervisory board, which was apparently compensated for by generous salaries. In 1930 Lifschütz is said to have received more salaries than the entire board of directors put together. Lifschütz was retired from 1931.
Isaac Lifschütz had been married to his wife Cäcilie († 1926) since 1887, who, like him, originally came from Pinsk. Both were non-denominational and tended to Protestantism. In addition to the daughters Sophie († 1942) and Elisabeth, Isaac Lifschütz was also the father of the lawyer and politician Alexander Lifschütz .
Publications
- Contributions to the knowledge of the composition of wool fat . In: Reports of the German Chemical Society . tape 28 , no. 3 , October 1895, p. 3133-3135 , doi : 10.1002 / cber.189502803155 .
- About the oxidation of cholesterol. (Oxycholesterols - Chollanic Acid) . In: Hoppe-Seyler's journal for physiological chemistry . tape 50 , no. 4-5 , Jan 1907, pp. 436-439 , doi : 10.1515 / bchm2.1907.50.4-5.436 .
literature
- Sabine Pamperrien : The doctor from Pinsk. CHEMISTRY Isaac Lifschütz invented Nivea cream - and was a bit ashamed of it. In: Jüdische Allgemeine , Edition 37, p. 19
Web links
- Eucerin: The story
- Eucerin: The brand - our company history ( Memento from February 11, 2013 in the web archive archive.today ) (with image of the patent application)
- neckar-chronik.de: Beiersdorf sells 123 million cans of Nivea cream every year
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c d e Sabine Pamperrien: The doctor from Pinsk - CHEMICALS - Isaac Lifschütz invented the Nivea cream - and was a bit ashamed of it. In: Jüdische Allgemeine, Edition 37, September 15, 2011. (The author, for her part, refers to the economic historian Sven Tode as an essential source.)
- ^ Berliner Bezirkslexikon, Charlottenburg-Wilmersdor
- ↑ Lexicon of the entire technology: fat sweat
- ^ Term according to NZZ am Sonntag: Das Beiersdorf-Jahrhundert , October 19, 2003, p. 53.
- ^ Sabine Pamperrien: Quite modern - JURA - The lawyer Alexander Lifschütz wrote German constitutional history. In: Jüdische Allgemeine, Edition 39, September 29, 2010, p. 19.
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Lifschütz, Isaac |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Lifschütz, Isaac |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German chemist |
| DATE OF BIRTH | March 15, 1852 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Pinsk , now Belarus |
| DATE OF DEATH | February 6, 1938 |
| Place of death | Hamburg |