Robert Wilhelm Eberhard Bunsen
Born in 1811 in Göttingen, Germany. Bunsen received his doctorate at the age of 20 from the University of Göttingen, where he studied under Professor Friedrich Stromeyer. He then spent three years traveling through Germany, France, Austria and Switzerland, visiting scientists and factories. In 1836 Bunsen succeeded Wöhler at the higher technical school at Cassel, and in 1851 he became a professor at Heidelberg, where he taught until retiring at the age of 78. Bunsen made many contributions to science. He discovered a cure for arsenic poisoning that is still in use today, invented a method of gas analysis while studying the gases from blast furnaces, he invented the carbon-zinc battery, the ice and vapor calorimeters, and perfected the Bunsen burner. He also traveled to Iceland to study geysers and hot springs. In 1859, Bunsen and Kirchhoff invented the spectroscope and subsequently discovered cesium (1860) and rubidium. He was the first to prepare significant quantities of lithium (1865). |
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