Summary
The chapter starts by praising all of those who contributed to the making of the periodic table. It clarifies how instead of inventing his famous burner, the German chemist Robert Bunsen , he improved its design and made it more popular. Arsenic, element number thirty three, had been used as poison, and Bunsen found it fantastic. He developed the antidote to arsenic by inserting iron oxide hydrate, that braces the arsenic in the blood, and then drags it out. His experiments made him lose the vision of one of his eyes, but his love for these type of reactions especially explosions arose. He invented the spectroscope, which allows on to study the elements using light. The elements produce a strand of light through the spectroscope when heated. Now he needed flames hot enough to see, and that is why he perfected the burner. The invention of the spectroscope helped discover new elements, and even categorize them.
Dmitry Mendeleev, was inspired by Bunsen. Mendeleev, with the help of six others, was responsible for arranging the elements, and creating the Periodic Table. He was not in a good economic condition as a child, especially after his father died, but his mom supported him and took him to a university where he became an excellent student, and after being enrolled, she died. Julius Lothar Meyer, who studied with Bunsen, discovered that red blood cells have oxygen on them. Both Mendeleev and Meyer arranged the periodic table in a similar pattern and both shared the Davy Medal. Mendeleev later on became very close minded about the parts of chemistry he could not see such as atoms and their subatomic particles. But Mendeleev, in contrast with Meyer, had hope for future chemists, for those spaces in the periodic table that were left empty.
Paul Emile François de Boisbaudran, a french master of the spectroscope discovered a new element, Gallium. This element will melt at a eighty four degree room temperature. Mendeleev tried to take credit since he had predicted the eka-aluminum. Mendeleev then stated that the information about the density and weight were wrong; Mendeleev was right. Mendeleev asides from being empowered by the fame and knowledge made plenty prediction to which not many were actually true. He got lucky with the Gallium scheme. For example he believed there were more elements before Hydrogen, and it wasn’t for other scientists that proved him wrong, he would have continued with this theory. The Lanthanides, became a puzzle, for scientists including Mendelev. He even admitted his loss and his need for help, as he could not uncover their buried electrons.
A teen by the name of Johann Friedrich Bottger, was magician-like, though many believed he was an alchemist including the king. The king wanted him to make gold, and because Bottger could not, he was to be hanged. The king spared his life only because he said he knew how to make porcelain, and together with the king’s porcelain man, Ehrenfried Walter von Tschirnhaus, the began to look for the secret ingredients to make porcelain. Tschirnhaus had just created an oven that reached the 3000 degrees Fahrenheit. When they melted the ingredients to find the white clay and a rock that shines called feldspar. After making porcelain, the king would not let them go as they were more valuable. The process spread and the mining of the shining rock did so too. The coastal town called Ytterby, there there was a lot of porcelain ore. Johan Gadolin heard from this, and he decided to study this phenomenon (of plenty rocks) and several new elements made it to the periodic table (elements ending with “ium”).
Reflection
This chapter had more drama than in other chapters. I would have said chapter two did, but this chapter had everything, from inventions, from selfishness, to encouragement, and to new discoveries. This is the basis of how it all began, since the periodic table is the base for most sciences specifically chemistry.
This chapter contained new scientists and with a more profound life. Mendeleev, for example. On my Honors Chemistry class I had only learned that he was the one that put together the periodic table, but instead, there is more to it. In this book I have learned more of his private life, and accomplishments, but also of his selfishness, and his ego. For a person who had humble origins, he became very egocentric, and a know-it-all. I thought he was the only one who put together the periodic table, but now I know that there were more people involved. He did encourage people to go find out more of the elements, and that is noble of him to encourage knowledge in other people. I like him as a scientist, but I dislike him as a person.
On the contrary, I really liked Bunsen. I like how after a failure, and after nearly losing his eye, he maintains the love for chemistry and discovery, and even grows stronger. He liked explosions, to see reactions occur in front of his eyes, and although he lived his life of the edge, I admire him for his valor following his curiosity.
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