Hans Tropsch

Infobox_Scientist
name = Hans Tropsch


image_width =
caption = Hans Tropsch
birth_date = birth date|1889|10|7
birth_place = Plan, Austria-Hungary now Czech Republic
residence =
nationality =
death_date = death date and age|1935|10|8|1889|10|7
death_place = Essen, Germany
field = Organic chemistry
work_institution = Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Coal Research
Institute for Coal Research Prague
Armour Institute of Technology
alma_mater = German Charles-Ferdinand University in Prague
doctoral_advisor = Hans Meyer
doctoral_students =
known_for = Fischer-Tropsch process
prizes =
religion =
footnotes =

Hans Tropsch (October 7 1889 – October 8 1935) was a Czech chemist responsible, along with Franz Fischer, for the development of the Fischer-Tropsch process.

Life

Tropsch was born in Plan, German Bohemia at that time part of Austria-Hungary now Czech Republic. He studied at the German Charles-Ferdinand University in Prague and the German Technical University in Prague from 1907 until 1913. He received his Ph.D for work with Hans Meyer.

Tropsch worked in a dye factory in Mülheim in 1916-1917, then for a few months at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Coal Research. From 1917 to 1920 Tropsch worked in a tar distillery of the Rütgers company in Niederau, but returned to the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Coal Research in 1920, staying until 1928. There he worked with both Franz Fischer and Otto Roelen. It was during this time that the ground-breaking inventions of the Fischer-Tropsch process were patented.

In 1928 Tropsch became professor at the new Institute for Coal Research in Prague. He later accepted a position in the United States at the Laboratories of Universal Oil Products and the Armour Institute of Technology in Chicago in 1931. Due to a severe illness Tropsch returned to Germany in 1935, where he died shortly after his arrival, in a hospital in Essen.

References

* cite journal
title = Problems in the Chemistry of Coal
author = Hans Tropsch
journal = Chemical Reviews
volume = 6
issue = 1
pages = 63 – 90
year = 1929
url =
doi = 10.1021/cr60021a004
* cite journal
title = Sitzung am 14. Oktober 1935
author = K. A. Hofniann
journal = Berichte der deutschen chemischen Gesellschaft
volume = 68
issue = 11
pages = A164 – A173
year = 1935
url =
doi = cber.19350681141
doi_brokendate = 2008-06-23