DUMAS, JEAN BAPTISTE-ANDRE & PIERRE PELLETIER. - TOWARDS A CLASSIFICATION OF ORGANIC COMPOUNDS.

Recherches sur la Composition élémentaire et sur quelques propriétes caractéristiques des bases salifiables organiques.

(Paris, Crochard, 1823). Without wrappers. In: "Annales de Chimie et de Physique, par Gay-Lussac et Arago", tome 24, Sec. Series, Cahier 2. Pp. 163-191. (Entire issue offered pp. 113-223.

First appearance of Dumas and Pelletier's importent paper in which they analyzed nine alkaloids by combustion and found for the first time the number of atoms of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen and nitrogen in them. Dumas' name is still associated with the two procedures which he devised here, the determination of vapor density and combustion analysis.

"The most important problem with which Dumas was concerned throughout his career was the classification of chemical substances. He sought to devise comprehensive classificatory schemes for organic compounds and for the elements. Dumas’s earliest contribution to organic chemistry was his study of nine alkaloids, published in 1823, jointly with Pierre Pelletier.1 He analyzed the elemental constituents of these organic “bases” and attempted to prove that their relative proportions of oxygen followed Dalton’s law of multiple proportions. He had embraced the ideas of the two reigning theories in contemporary chemistry: dualism, with its division of substances into electronegative (acid) and electropositive (alkaline); and atomism, which Dalton had used to explain his law. Dumas spent the next few years attempting to create an adequate system of classification of organic compounds based upon these two theories."(DSB).

Order-nr.: 44741