Crucibles: The Story of Chemistry from Ancient Alchemy to Nuclear FissionThis book is a classic in the field of popular science. Standard reading since the 1930s, it is one of the few historeis of chemistry to concentrate on the lives of the great chemists. Through these dramatic and human stories, it gives an authoritative and entertaining account of the great discoveries and advances in this scientific field. After many printings in three previous editions, this book has been newly revised by the author for this fourth edition. Beginning with Trevisan and his lifelong search for the "philosopher's stone," the author narrates the lives and discoveries of such towering figures as Paracelsus and his chemical treatment of disease; Priestley looking for phlogiston and finding oxygen and carbon dioxide, Lavoisier creating a new language of chemistry; Dalton and his Atomic Theory; Avogadro and the idea of molecules, Mendeleeff arranging the table of elements under his Periodic Law; the Curies isolating radium; Thomson discovering the electron; Moseley and his Law of Atomic Numbers; Lawrence and the construction of the cyclotron; and more. Probably the most dramatic chapter in the book, the account of the development of nuclear fission, ends the story of chemistry at its most monumental achievement. A final chapter discusses some of the consequences of nuclear fission, the discovery of nuclear fusion, and the recent work with subatomic particles. Bernard Jaffe is the author of many other science books and several science textbooks. Upon the original publication of this book, Mr. Jaffe received the Francis Bacon Award for the Humanizing of Knowledge. The American Chemical Society's History of Chemistry Division honored him in 1973 with its Dexter Award for "distinguished achievement in the history of chemistry." |
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User Review - pre20cenbooks - LibraryThingMore than halfway read. Find this bio well worded, intensely intriguing, revealing the personality, social background, intertwining of discoverers of the elements behaviors, the egotism and some humility, eccentric personalities too. Highly recommended. Centuries of exploration, the roots. Read full review
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User Review - mykl-s - LibraryThing-science is more than science -this is a real classic Read full review
Contents
| 1 | |
| 13 | |
| 25 | |
| 37 | |
| 55 | |
| 69 | |
| 84 | |
JOHN JACOB BERZELIUS 17791848 | 100 |
DMITRI IVANOVITCH MENDELÉEFF 18341907 | 150 |
SVANTE ARRHENIUS 18591927 | 164 |
MARIE SKLODOWSKA CURIE 18671934 | 181 |
JOSEPH JOHN THOMSON 18561940 AND ERNEST RUTHERFORD 18711937 | 197 |
Niels Bohr 18851962 | 237 |
ERNEST ORLANDO LAWRENCE 19011958 | 265 |
THE MEN WHO HARNESSED NUCLEAR ENERGY | 283 |
NUCLEAR ENERGY TODAY AND TOMORROW | 308 |
Other editions - View all
Crucibles: The Story of Chemistry from Ancient Alchemy to Nuclear Fission Bernard Jaffe Limited preview - 2012 |
Common terms and phrases
accepted acid American Arrhenius atomic weights became Becher believed Berzelius body bomb called Cavendish century charged chemical chemistry complete compounds containing continued Dalton developed discovered discovery earth effects electric electron elements energy England experimental experiments facts field finally fire fission four gases gold half-life hand heat hundred hydrogen idea isotopes Italy known laboratory later Lavoisier light lived Marie mass matter means metal method molecules nature neutrons never nitrogen nuclear nucleus obtained once organic oxygen Paris particles passed phlogiston physics pile positive present Priestley problem produced professor pure radioactive radium remained Rutherford scientific scientists showed single Society solution soon strange structure substance theory Thomson thought thousand tube turned United University uranium volume whole Woehler wrote young
Popular passages
Page 20 - If I stoop Into a dark tremendous sea of cloud, It is but for a time ; I press God's lamp Close to my breast ; its splendor, soon or late, Will pierce the gloom : I shall emerge one day.
Page 90 - All these things being considered, it seems probable to me that God in the beginning formed matter in solid, massy, hard, impenetrable, movable particles, of such sizes and figures, and with such other properties and in such proportion to space as most conduced to the end for which he formed them...
Page 292 - In the course of the last four months it has "been made probable through the work of Joliot in ?rance as well as 7ermi and Szilard in America - that it may "become possible to set up a nuclear chain reaction in a large mass of uranium /by which vast amounts of power and large quantities of new radium-like elements would be generated.
Page 38 - Britain, at the expense of three millions, has killed one hundred and fifty Yankees this campaign — which is twenty thousand pounds a head; and at Bunker's Hill she gained a mile of ground, half of which she lost again by our taking post on Ploughed Hill. During the same time ,wjv sixty thousand children have been born in America.
Page 6 - Screaming as harshly in the fitful wind, And all without went on — as aye it will, Sunshine or tempest, reckless that a heart Is breaking, or has broken, in its change. The fire beneath the crucible was out ; The vessels of his mystic art lay round, Useless and cold as the ambitious hand That fashioned them...
Page 47 - ... for as a candle burns out much faster in dephlogisticated than in common air, so we might, as may be said, live out too fast, and the animal powers be too soon exhausted in this pure kind of air. A moralist, at least, may say that the air which nature has provided for us is as good as we deserve.
Page 292 - A single bomb of this type, carried by boat and exploded in a port, might very well destroy the whole port together with some of the surrounding territory. However, such bombs might very well prove to be too heavy for transportation by air.
Page 62 - I took a glass globe, holding 8800 grain measures, furnished with a brass cock and an apparatus for firing air by electricity. This globe was well exhausted by an air-pump, and then filled with a mixture of inflammable and dephlogisticated air, by shutting the cock, fastening...
Page 211 - It was quite the most incredible event that has ever happened to me in my life. It was almost as incredible as if you fired a 15-inch shell at a piece of tissue paper and it came back and hit you.
Bibliographic information
| Title | Crucibles: The Story of Chemistry from Ancient Alchemy to Nuclear Fission Dover Books on Physics and Chemistry Dover books on chemistry, physical chemistry, biochemistry |
| Author | Bernard Jaffe |
| Edition | illustrated, reprint |
| Publisher | Courier Corporation, 1976 |
| ISBN | 0486233421, 9780486233420 |
| Length | 368 pages |
| Subjects | › › Science / Chemistry / General Science / General |
| Export Citation | BiBTeX EndNote RefMan |