- Johan Gadolin
Infobox Scientist
name = Johan Gadolin
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caption = Johan Gadolin
birth_date =June 5 ,1760
birth_place =Turku
death_date =August 15 ,1852
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nationality = Finnish
ethnicity =
field =chemistry
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known_for =yttrium
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Johan Gadolin (June 5 ,1760 –August 15 ,1852 ) was a Finnishchemist ,physicist andmineralogist . Gadolin discovered thechemical element yttrium . He was also the founder of Finnishchemistry research, as the second holder of the Chair of Chemistry, established in 1761 and first held by Pehr Adrian Gadd (April 4, 1727 – August 11, 1797).Early life
Johan Gadolin was born in
Turku ,Finland . He began to studymathematics at theRoyal Academy of Turku when he was fifteen. Soon he found mathematics too laborious and changed his major to chemistry. In 1779 Gadolin moved toUppsala University where he was taught byTorbern Bergman .Chemistry
Gadolin became famous when he discovered the first
rare earth element . In 1792 Gadolin received a sample of black, heavymineral found in aquarry in the Swedish villageYtterby nearStockholm . By careful experiments, he isolated a rare earth oxide which was later namedyttria . He also isolated in the same study yttrium trihydroxide. Yttria, or yttrium oxide, was the first known rare earth metal compound — at that time, it was regarded as an element. The work was published in 1794.The mineral that Gadolin examined was named
gadolinite in 1800. The oxide of the elementgadolinium ,gadolinia , was named after Gadolin by its discoverers.In an earlier paper in 1788 Gadolin showed that the same element can show several oxidation states, in his case Sn(II) and Sn(IV) 'by combining itself with larger or smaller amounts of the calcinating substance'. He vividly described the
disproportionation reaction 2 Sn(II) = Sn(0) + Sn(IV).Gadolin also studied
specific heat s andlatent heat s in 1787–92. This thermochemical work was very precise.One of his latest studies was the chemical analysis of the Chinese alloy
pak tong (alpacca, German silver) in 1810 and 1827.Gadolin became the professor of chemistry at the Royal Academy of Åbo in 1797. He was one of the first chemists who gave laboratory exercises to students. He even allowed the students to use his private laboratory. Gadolin wrote the first anti-
phlogiston chemistry textbook in theNordic countries .References
*Citation
id =PMID :8796552
url= http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8796552
last=Dean
first=P B
last2=Dean
first2=K I
publication-date=1996 Aug
year=1996
title=Sir Johan Gadolin of Turku: the grandfather of gadolinium.
volume=3 Suppl 2
issue=
periodical=Academic radiology
pages=S165-9External links
* [http://homepage.mac.com/dtrapp/people/JGadolin.pdf Sir Johan Gadolin of Turku: The Grandfather of Gadolinium]
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