Tag: Alessandro Volta
-
Berzelius, father of Swedish chemistry
Born in 1779 in East Gotland in the southern part of Sweden, Jons Jacob Berzelius descended from an old Swedish family in which many of his ancestors had been clergymen. His father, a schoolteacher, died when he was four years old. His mother soon remarried but died shortly thereafter in 1787, so he was raised…
-
Luigi Galvani: beginnings of electrophysiology
JMS PearceEast Yorks, England Physicist or physician? Scientist or healer? Artificially, these are divisions that have classified doctors through the ages. Luigi Galvani (1737-1798) (Fig 1.) showed that it was possible to be an amalgam of both. The word “galvanize” derives not from physics but from Galvani, a medical doctor who studied electricity in animal…
-
Jöns Jacob Berzelius: physician, scientist, and globetrotter
Frank WollheimSweden Jöns Jacob Berzelius (1779-1848) was not only the enigmatic Swedish chemist of his time but also an accomplished medical doctor, active humanitarian, co-founder of the Karolinska Institute, and secretary of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences for thirty years. He also mastered the pen, leaving 7000 letters, several books, diaries, and an autobiography.1…