Majima Rikō

Majima Rikō ( Japanese 真 島 利 行 , new reading Majima Toshiyuki ; * 1874 in Kyoto , † 1962 ) was a Japanese chemist. He is considered the first research chemist in organic chemistry in Japan.

Life

Majima was the eldest son of a well-to-do doctor and studied chemistry at the Imperial University of Tokyo from 1896 . He graduated in 1899 with a doctorate from Joji Sakurai and was research assistant at Sakurai Jōji (1858-1939). While Sakurai was interested in physical chemistry, Majima was drawn to organic chemistry, which he learned from German chemical literature, which was studied in reading seminars at the university. His research focus was on the investigation of natural substances occurring in Japan, in particular the urushioles of the lacquer tree . They were discovered and named in 1906 by Miyama Kisaburō (* 1873) and Majima had obtained permission to deal with them from Miyama, who was mainly interested in paint applications. In 1903 he became an assistant professor and from 1907 to 1911 the education authorities sent him to Europe to study abroad. He studied with Carl Dietrich Harries in Kiel and with Richard Willstätter in Zurich. He applied the newly learned methods to the study of urushiole. After returning in 1911, he became a professor of organic chemistry at the newly established Tohoku Imperial University .

He was able to prove that the urushiols are catechol derivatives.

The study of natural products (especially from Japan) was the main research area in organic chemistry in Japan until the 1950s. Many of Majima’s disciples, such as Nozoe Tetsuo, worked in this field.

In 1936 he became a member of the Leopoldina . In 1951 he was honored as a person with special cultural merits .

literature

• Masanori Kaji: The Transformation of Organic Chemistry in Japan: From Majima Riko to the Third International Symposium on the Chemistry of Natural Products , International Workshop on the History of Chemistry, Tokyo 2015, pdf

Web links

• Rikô Majima’s entry as a member of the German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina , accessed on March 8, 2017.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ biographical data, publications and Academic pedigree of Riko (Toshiyuki) Majima at academictree.org, accessed on January 1 of 2019.

Japanese name: As is common in Japan, the family name comes before the first name in this article . Thus Majima is the family name, Rikō the first name.