Sir William Perkin (1838-1907)

An English chemist that began his career at a very young age, acting as a “backyard chemist”. Perkin’s early main goal was to synthesize quinine, a substance used to treat malaria, so that it wouldn’t have to be harvested from the cinchona tree in South America. Though Perkin was not able to synthesize quinine, he did synthesize mauvenine, the first synthetic dye. Producing the first synthetic dye opened up the world of pharmaceuticals by being able to stain bacteria — even inhibit them — using synthetic dyes.

Made with Paper

Melvin Schwartz (1932-2006)

A Jewish American physicist that won the 1998 Nobel Prize in Physics alonside Leon M. Lederman and Jack Steinberger for their development of the neutrino beam method and their demonstration of the doublet structure of leptons (elementary particles of matter such as electrons).

A small thanks for FiftyThree’s shout out.

Made with Paper

Victor Grignard (1871-1935)

Most well known for his work developing Grignard reagents for use in the addition of R groups to ketones, forming alkoxides. As with Gilman reagents, Grignard reagents are an important tool for nucleophilic addition for developing larger molecules from smaller compounds.

Victor Grignard also has one of the best mustaches of any scientist. Ever.

Made with Paper

Henry Gilman (1893-1986)

An American organic chemist, who developed an important method of replacing halides with R groups using organocuprates. This method allows organic chemists to not only synthesize an array of molecules, but also provides a mechanism to join large molecules from smaller ones.

Made with Paper

Georg Wittig (1897-1987)

Wittig won a the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1979 alongside Herbert C. Brown for reporting new methods for the synthesis of alkenes from aldehydes and ketones using triphenyl phosphonium ylide. The Wittig reaction is a very applicable and common tool in organic chemistry. 

Made with Paper