WURTZ, ADOLPHE. - THE DISCOVERY OF THE AMINES IN CHEMISTRY.

Mémoire sur une Série D'Alcaloïdes homologues avec L'Ammoniaque.

Paris, Victor Masson, 1855. 8vo. Without wrappers. In 'Annales de Chimie et de Physique', Series 3 , tome 30, December-issue. With halftitle to vol. 30. Pp. 385-508 a. 1 plate. (Entire issue offered). Wurtz's paper: pp. 443-506.

First appearance of the entire memoir in which Wurtz describes his outstanding discovery of Liebig’s prediction, that there might be organic compounds analogous to ammonia and derivable from it by the replacement of hydrogen - the amines. The discovery was announced in 1849, and a small extract was printed in "Comptes rendu" (4 pp.). The offered paper is the memoir in full.

Wurtz is most noted for his investigation of glycols and for his discovery of the amines. The latter discovery in 1849 (the paper offered) was very significant at the time, for ot suggested the possibility of a new type, the ammonia type, which helped to explain the behaviour of nitrogenous compounds. (Leicester & Klickstein "A Source Book..", pp. 362-63). - Parkinson "Breakthroughs" 1849 C.

Charles Adolphe Wurtz, was born at Strasbourg 1817. For many years he was Professor of Chemistry at the Ecole de Médicine and at Sorbonne in Paris. He was known not only for his researches in organic chemistry but also for his many literary works. He was editor of a Dictionnaire de Chemie Pure et Appliquée, and after 1868 one of the editors of the Annalen der Chemie et de Physique. He died in Paris in 1884.

Order-nr.: 45031