Chemical Education Today
Anniversaries: 2001 by Paul F. Schatz
1951 (50 years ago)
1901 (100 years ago) The National Bureau of Standards is established. Japanese-American chemist Jokichi HO Takamine isolates adrenaline from aniNHCH3 mal adrenal glands. This is the first isolation of a pure hormone. The chemical name for adrenaline is epinephrine. The element Europium is discovOH ered by Eugene Demarcay. OH The first Nobel Prizes are awarded. epinephrine Wilhelm Roentgen is the recipient of the Nobel Prize in physics for his discovery of X-rays. The Nobel Prize in chemistry is awarded to Jacobus Van’t Hoff for his work in chemical kinetics and osmotic pressure. He also proposed that atoms bonded to a carbon atom are located at the apexes of a O tetrahedron. The first synthetic vat dye, indanthrene blue, is prepared by René Bohm. HN O Gerrit Grijns NH O demonstrates that the material removed during the polishing of rice prevents beriberi. O Symptoms of beriberi inindanthrene blue clude neurological and gastrointestinal disorders. In severe cases it can result in paralysis and death. Later work by others leads to the elaboration of the vitamin B complex (the water-soluble vitamins). The antiberiberi factor was designated vitamin B1 and was later shown to be thiamine. HCl N N
NH2
S CH2CH2OH
N CH2
+
Cl
−
CH3
Fritz Lipmann discovers acetylcoenzyme A, the key compound in the production of energy by the metabolism of carbohydrates and fats. In seven landmark papers published in the May issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Linus Pauling and his coworkers are the first to propose the α-helix structure for polypeptides (proteins). His announcement is Spindletop Dome. met with much chagrin at Cambridge University, where a high-powered group of physicists and chemists including Sir William Bragg, Max Perutz, and Alexander Todd are working on similar problems. Ernst Otto Fischer begins work on ferrocene. He determines the structure to be an iron atom sandwiched between two rings of carbon atoms, demonstrating a new type of bonding in organometallic compounds. William Haskins dies. Haskins developed the concept of the packing fraction for atomic nuclei. This is used to explain the generation of energy in stars, fusion power, and the hydrogen bomb. The structure of ferrocene. Structure rendered by Paul F. Schatz and Randall J. Wildman, using MacSpartan software.
thiamine hydrochloride
Victor Grignard develops and describes organomagnesium halides (Grignard reagents) in his doctoral thesis at the University of Lyon. The Grignard reaction is one of the most frequently used synthetic methods in organic chemistry. The modern age of oil was born when the Lucas well on the Spindletop saltdome near Beaumont, Texas, blew on January 10. By October, there were 65 flowing wells which produced 3.5 million barrels of oil in the first year and 17.5 million barrels in the following year. Prominent scientists born in 1901 include Linus Pauling, Vincent du Vigneaud, Conrad Elvehjem, Ernest Lawrence, Enrico Fermi, Marcus Oliphant, and Werner Heisenberg.
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Journal of Chemical Education • Vol. 78 No. 1 January 2001 • JChemEd.chem.wisc.edu
A page from Grignard’s lab notebook (from Bulletin de la Société Chimique de France, frontispiece, 1950).
U.S. postage stamp commemorating the ACS Diamond Jubilee.
The UNIVAC I computer is built. The prophylactic effect of fluoride for the prevention of dental caries is discovered. Besides being controversial in its own right, fluoridation spawns a controversy over the correct word to use in describing addition of fluorides to drinking water. Is it fluoridize and fluoridation, or fluorinate and fluorination? The verdict: fluoridize, fluoridation as in oxidize, oxidation. Krebiozen, a mysterious compound produced from horse serum by secret methods developed by Stevan Durovic, is promoted by A. C. Ivy as a promising cancer drug. In 1966, Ivy, Durovic, and others are found not guilty of fraud in selling the drug as an agent for suppressing cancer. The Food and Drug Administration cracks down on salesmen promoting crude black molasses as a natural “wonder food” that is claimed to prevent or cure 27 diseases including cancer, tuberculosis, and heart disease. The Diamond Jubilee of the American Chemical Society is celebrated at their Fall National meeting in New York City. One of the highlights is the commemorative postage stamp unveiled at the event. James B. Conant, a prominent chemist, author, and educator who is president of Harvard University, addresses the Ceremonial Session of the Diamond Jubilee and looks fifty years into the future. His address appeared in Chemical & Engineering News, Vol. 29, Sept. 17, 1951, pp 3847–3849. Other chemists made predictions as well, which were reported in Chemical & Engineering News, Vol. 29, Aug. 13, 1951, pp 3274–3275. Excerpts from each article appear in the box on the next page. Antabuse is introS S duced as a deterrent for alcohol consumption. CH3CH2 C C CH2CH3 N S S N Ingestion of alcohol after administration of CH3CH2 CH2CH3 antabuse results in a seantabuse (disulfiram) vere reaction that includes vasodilation, tachycardia, nausea, vomiting, and convulsions. A group of Harvard chemists led by R. B. Woodward announces the first synthesis of a precursor of saturated steroids. The compound, dl-methyl-3-keto-4,9(11),16etiocholatrienate, can be carried on to other steroid hormones
JChemEd.chem.wisc.edu • Vol. 78 No. 1 January 2001 • Journal of Chemical Education
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Chemical Education Today
Anniversaries: 2001
CH3
CH3
CO2CH3
CH3
CH3
HO
O Woodward steroid precursor
cholesterol CH3
O
HO
OH C
CH
O equilenin
Predictions from ACS Diamond Jubilee From Conant’s Address It is the year 2001 A.D. and the birth pangs of a new era have subsided. Equalization of distribution of the world’s goods has destroyed the fear that begets wars, and the people are waging peace. Biochemistry, …by 1985 has become the recognized successor to what was once called biology. Solar energy, …by the end of the century is the dominating factor in the production of industrial power. The problem of overpopulation, while not solved, promises to be in hand before 2050. I see the chemists in increasing numbers continuing to crowd into fields once reserved for others. Other Predictions New Compounds
Carbon will have been polymerized to give diamonds and the other carbon lattices filling the gap between diamond and graphite will be known. Hermann Mark, Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn Tools of Living
Vehicles will be of weight-saving plastic-metal combinations. Housing will make substantial use of synthetics—all piping will be plastic; most roofing and siding will be coated fabrics…universal two-way wireless between all homes with optional television, also wireless electrical appliances. Hermann Mark, Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn Foods
Seeds will be exposed to cosmic bombardment, resulting in varieties of plants tailored to need through mutation speed-up. Harold Vagtborg, Southwest Research Institute Interplanetary Travel
At least one man will have circumnavigated the moon and returned safely. C. C. Furnas, Cornell Aeronautical Lab., Inc.
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CH3
norethindrone
and cholesterol. The synthesis of cholesterol marks the finish of a highly competitive race between a group of Harvard chemists led by Woodward and a group of chemists at Oxford University led by Sir Robert Robinson to be the first to synthesize cholesterol. A group of Syntex chemists led by Carl Djerassi develop a progesterone-like compound called norethindrone, which gained FDA approval as an oral contraceptive in 1960. Werner E. Bachmann dies. In 1939, Bachmann accomplished the first total synthesis of a steroid, equilenin. Equilenin differs from saturated steroids in that rings A and B are aromatic. Spokesmen for the USSR Academy of Sciences attacked Linus Pauling’s resonance theory of bonding as “pseudoscience”, “vicious”, and an example of “world outlooks hostile to the Marxist view”. Attacks of this type are reminiscent of the attacks on Mendelian genetics in 1948 by Lysenko. Edward McMillan and Glenn Seaborg share the Nobel Prize in chemistry for their discoveries in the chemistry of the transuranium elements, including the discovery of plutonium. John Cockcroft and T. S. Walton share the Nobel Prize in physics for developing the voltage multiplier and using it to bombard atomic nuclei with accelerated protons. This was the first nuclear reaction using accelerated particles and the first not to use natural radioactivity. Serotonin, a blood vessel constrictor, is synthesized by chemists at Upjohn Co. M. E. Speeter, one of the chemists, explained that serotonin affects most smooth muscle receptors. Today, serotonin is recognized as a neurotransmitter, and imbalances in serotonin levels are linked to a variety of neurological disorders such as depression and migraine headaches. A new refining process for “low-grade” sulfur ores is developed by a subsidiary of American Cyanamid. In 1951 sulfur is a strategic material and in high demand and short supply. The new process is much more economically attractive than the standard Frasch process.
Journal of Chemical Education • Vol. 78 No. 1 January 2001 • JChemEd.chem.wisc.edu
Vitamin A acetate, m.p. 60 °C, one of the three commercial forms of vitamin A. Others are alcohol and palmitate. (Chem. Eng. News 1951, 29, 3962).
Otto Meyerhof dies. Meyerhof was awarded the 1922 Nobel Prize in medicine for his studies of lactic acid and its relation to muscular energy. He came to the United States in 1940, one of many intellectuals fleeing the Hitler regime in Europe. Helium-3 is solidified for the first time by researchers at Argonne National Laboratory. Helium-3 and helium-4 are unique in that both require low temperature, near absolute zero, and high pressure in order to solidify. A heart–lung machine is developed by a group of scientists from Drexel Institute of Technology and Hahnemann Hospital in Philadelphia, allowing surgeons to bypass live heart action in order to perform cardiac surgery. A commercial synthesis of vitamin A alcohol is developed by Otto Isler of
Hoffman-La Roche. The starting material is β-ionone, a constituent of lemongrass oil and an intermediate used in the perfume industry. All products in the 12-step synthesis are crystalline and the yields at each step are 80% or better. The first “experimental nuclear detonations” are carried out at the Atomic Energy Commission’s Nevada testing ground. Press reports of the explosion said that the sound of the explosion and the flash of light were observed halfway across Arizona, in the southwestern part of Utah, and on the southeastern fringe of California. Paul F. Schatz is in the Department of Chemistry, University of Wisconsin– Madison, 1101 University Avenue, Madison, WI 53706-1396; email:
[email protected].
The structure of serotonin. Structure rendered by Paul F. Schatz and Randall J. Wildman, using MacSpartan software.
JChemEd.chem.wisc.edu • Vol. 78 No. 1 January 2001 • Journal of Chemical Education
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