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Richard August Carl Emil Erlenmeyer (28 June 1825 – 22 January 1909), known simply as Emil Erlenmeyer, was a German chemist known for contributing to the early development of the theory of chemical structure and formulating the Erlenmeyer rule. He also designed the Erlenmeyer flask, a specialized apparatus ubiquitous in chemistry laboratories, which is named after him.
In 1855 he moved to Heidelberg to work on the chemistry of fertilizers in the laboratory of Robert Bunsen. He wished to teach, but Bunsen's associates were not allowed to take private students. Therefore, with his wife's help, he converted a shed into a private laboratory. In 1857 he became a privatdocent and his habilitation thesis "On the manufacture of the artificial manure known as superphosphate" contained a description of several crystalline substances which greatly interested Robert Bunsen. It was while at Heidelberg that Erlenmeyer was brought under the influence of August Kekulé, whose theoretical views he was one of the first to adopt. He was the first to suggest, in 1862, that double and triple bonds could form between carbon atoms, and he made other important contributions to the development of theories of molecular structure.
His work mostly focused on theoretical chemistry, where he suggested the structural formula for naphthalene. The Erlenmeyer rule states that all alcohols in which the hydroxyl group is attached directly to a double-bonded carbon atom become or (cf. Enol).
Erlenmeyer's practical investigations were concerned mostly with aliphatic compounds. In 1859 he synthesised aminohexoic acid and proceeded to study the general behavior of on hydrolysis. He worked out methods to determine the relative amounts of leucine and tyrosine, which are produced during the degradation of several substances of this class, and was the first (1860) to understand the nature of glycide and to suggest that this substance is related to glycerol in the same way as is metaphosphoric acid to orthophosphoric acid. In the following year he studied the action of hydroiodic acid on glycerol, and showed that the product was isopropyl iodide- and not propyl iodide. His investigations of the higher alcohols produced during fermentation yielded the important proof that these alcohols do not belong to the normal series.
His other work included the isolation of glycolic acid from unripe grapes (1864), synthesis of sodium oxalate by heating sodium formate (1868), hydrolysis of ether to alcohol (1858), synthesis of phenyl-lactic acid (1880), preparation of pyruvic acid by the distillation of tartaric acid (1881) and the formation of carbostyril from quinoline (1885).
His investigations in the aromatic series include isomerism of the and the synthesis of tyrosine from phenylalanine (1882). In 1875, by nitrating benzoic acid, Erlenmeyer disproved the prevalent opinion that more than three nitrobenzoic acids exist.
In 1860 he published a description of the Erlenmeyer flask that bears his name.Emil Erlenmeyer, "Zur chemischen und pharmazeutischen Technik," Zeitschrift für Chemie und Pharmacie, vol. 3 (January 1860), 21-22. He wrote that he first displayed the new flask at a pharmaceutical conference in Heidelberg in 1857, and that he had arranged for its commercial production and sale by local glassware manufacturers.
Lineage
Emil Erlenmeyer is the grandfather of Hans Erlenmeyer.
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