Theodor Grotthuss

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Theodor Grotthuss
Theodor Grotthuss

Baron Christian Johann Dietrich Theodor von Grotthuss (* 20th January 1785 in Leipzig , † March 14 . Jul / 26. March  1822 . Greg in Geddutz (now Gedučiai), Lithuania ) was a Baltic German scientists. He developed the Grotthuss mechanism for conductivity in aqueous solutions, named after him .

Life

Theodor Grotthuss came from the German-Baltic noble family Grotthuss . He was the son of the landlord and composer Dietrich Ewald von Grotthuss (1751–1786) and his wife Elisabeth Eleonore, née. von Grotthuss from the Geddutz family (1755–1831). He was born while his parents were traveling in Leipzig, where Christian Felix Weisse became his godfather. Weisse made sure that Grotthuss was enrolled at the University of Leipzig as a toddler . However, he spent most of his childhood on his parents' estate in what was then the Russian Governorate of Courland . Contrary to the educational intentions of his tutors, he dealt with the natural sciences and studied all available literature of this kind.

In 1803 Grotthuss traveled to Leipzig to study natural sciences there, which he then continued in Paris . At the École polytechnique he heard a. a. Claude-Louis Berthollet and his colleagues in the fight for the anti-inflammatory theory of Antoine François de Fourcroy .

After he moved to Italy, Grotthuss got to know the experiments on electrolytic water decomposition there. To this end, he developed his own theory in 1805, which made him known among scholars in Europe.

The following year, after a stopover in Paris, he returned to Courland to take over the management of the inherited property. There Theodor Grotthuss continued his electrochemical research without direct contact with other scientists. In doing so, he came up with a number of new, independent ideas, all of which were related to the phenomenon of the generation of galvanic (electrical) current by means of the so-called voltaic column (electrochemical direct current source) constructed in 1800 . Grotthuss was one of the first scientists to systematically examine the "wonderful effects of electricity ", in which he saw "one of the most effective drives in the great tasks of nature". Of fundamental importance were his considerations to explain the current mechanism in electrolytes.

Building on the knowledge he gained, Grotthuss systematically expanded his view of electrochemistry . He indicated u. a. Processes on the electrodes as oxidation or reduction processes that always take place alternately and in a corresponding ratio.

The use of potassium thiocyanate to detect iron and cobalt goes back to him (1817/18).

In 1819 he published a treatise on the chemical effectiveness of light . In it, almost a quarter of a century before other scientists, he founded the photochemical absorption law ( Grotthuss-Draper law ), according to which only the fraction of incident radiation that is absorbed by this system can cause effects in a physical-chemical system.

The first and only volume of his “physico-chemical” research, published in 1820, became his scientific legacy. At the age of 37, Grotthuss committed suicide on March 14, 1822 on his Geddutz estate due to an incurable disease. His scientific work went almost unnoticed at the time. Its importance, which could have been groundbreaking for other researchers, was actually only revealed in the 20th century.

From 1815 he was a corresponding member of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences .

Works

  • Mémoire sur la décomposition de l'eau et des corps qu'elle tient en dissolution à l'aide de l'électricité galvanique. Rome 1805
Digital copy , Bavarian State Library
  • Physico-chemical research. First volume Nuremberg: Schrag 1820
Digital copy , Bavarian State Library
  • Tables of connection ratios or chemical equivalents, in parts of space and weight of the simple and compound bodies of the inorganic realm: together with a complete development of the calculations for the investigation of the specific weights of the various types of gas and vapor, details of their densities in the mutual connection , their required amounts of oxygen during combustion, etc .: designed for practical use by chemists, physicists, technicians, pharmacists, especially analysts. Nuremberg 1821
Digital copy , Bavarian State Library
  • Treatises on electricity and light . Edited by R. Luther and AJ von Oettingen. Ostwald's classic no.152, Leipzig 1906

literature

Web links

Commons : Theodor Grotthuß  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ CJT de Grotthuss (1806): Sur la décomposition de l'eau et des corps qu'elle tient en dissolution à l'aide de l'électricité galvanique. In: Ann. Chim. (Paris). Vol. 58, pp. 54-73.
  2. ↑ Winfried Pötsch u. a. Lexicon of important chemists , Harri Deutsch 1989, p. 180, article Theodor von Grotthus
  3. ↑ Member entry of Theodor Freiherr von Grotthuss at the Bavarian Academy of Sciences , accessed on February 17, 2017.
personal data
SURNAME Grotthuss, Theodor
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Grotthuss, Christian Johann Dietrich Freiherr von; Grotthuss, Christian Johann Theodor Freiherr von; Grothuss, Theodor Freiherr von; Grothuss, Christian Johann Theodor Freiherr von; Grothuss, Christian Johann Dietrich Freiherr von
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German-Baltic chemist
DATE OF BIRTH January 20, 1785
PLACE OF BIRTH Leipzig
DATE OF DEATH March 26, 1822
Place of death Geddutz , Lithuania