Henri Braconnot
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Henri Braconnot | |
---|---|
Born | 29 May 1780 |
Died | 13 January 1855 | (aged 74)
Nationality | French |
Known for | discovered chitin and pectin |
Scientific career | |
Fields | Chemistry, Pharmacy |
Henri Braconnot (French: [ɑ̃ʁi bʁakɔno]; 29 May 1780 – 13 January 1855) was a French chemist and pharmacist.
He was born in Commercy, his father being a counsel at the local parliament. At the death of his father, in 1787, Henri began his instruction in an elementary school in Commercy and then with private teachers.
At 13, he was placed as apprentice in a pharmacy in Nancy where he learned and practiced pharmacy, chemistry, and botany. At 15, he left Nancy for a military service in an hospital in Strasbourg.
In 1801-1802, he lived in
From 1802 to his death, he lived in Nancy where he was named in 1807 as director of the botanical garden and member of the scientific academy of the town. He worked as a chemist until his death mainly on plant chemistry. He made several research on plant assimilation, organic acids, plant composition and fats. He made also minor contributions to mineralogy and hydrology.
He was elected in 1823 correspondent member of the
In the fat domain, Braconnot described in 1815 that fats are formed of a solid part ("absolute tallow") and an oily compound ("absolute oil"), their consistency resulting from the proportions of the two parts. This conclusion was obtained after pressing fats in the cold between filter papers (Ann Chimie 1815, 93, 225). Furthermore, after
As these data were similar to the first data obtained by Chevreul as soon as 1813, the later sent a letter to the journal
In the domain of plant chemistry, Braconnot contributed to the isolation and the description of several compounds, most of which were shown later to be mixtures of simpler products. Among others, Braconnot discovered
In 1825, he discovered a structural
References
- Labrude, Pierre; Becq, Corinne (2003), "[Pharmacist and chemist Henri Braconnot]", Revue d'histoire de la pharmacie, vol. 51, no. 337, pp. 61–78, PMID 12894794
- Braconnot, sa vie et ses travaux. Nicklès J, Grimblot et veuve Raybois, Nancy 1856.
- Henry Braconnot, précurseur ignoré et émule de M.E. Chevreul. François M-Th, Oléagineux 1956, 11, 365.
- Le pharmacien et chimiste Henri Braconnot (Commercy 1780-Nancy 1855). Labrude P, Rev Hist Pharm 2003, 51, 61.
Note: the original version of this article is from https://web.archive.org/web/20041011172546/http://www.cyberlipid.org/chevreul/braconnot.htm (copyright free). Permission to copy content here was kindly granted by the author, Claude Leray.