Essential Scientists in Chemistry
Who are they?
While all chemic scientists are important, these are the few who contributed the most to our curriculum. They are all essential and important to various aspects of science and together form the picture of chemistry today.
John Dalton
English scientist (1766-1844) believed that atoms were the smallest unit of matter and could not be broken down into smaller parts because he did not have the means to prove otherwise.
William Crookes
1870, created Crookes tube using an empty tube and sending a charge through it. This resulted in a green beam of light going through the tube. This proved the existence of small particles, but did not specify whether they were atoms or light.
J.J. Thomson
1897, edited Crookes tube by adding a magnet to the side of the tube. If the beam reacted it proved that the particles are not just light. Result: beam best toward magnet. This proved the existence of atoms and their subatomic particles- specifically the electron. His idea of an atom was a ball with electrons spread evenly throughout.
Ernest Rutherford
1911, created an experiment to test Thomson's idea, aimed alpha particles at a piece of gold foil; if it went through, Thomson was right, if it didn't, he was wrong. Result: some bounced back, others passed through. This proved Thomson wrong, there must be some positive parts of an atom. Therefor, the proton and neutron were discovered and Rutherford's model is the one we currently use.
Niels Bohr
Created the Bohr diagram, a detailed structure of all atoms electrons.
Gilbert Lewis
Creator of the Lewis structure, a diagram which helps find the number of valence electrons in an atom.
Dmitri Mendeleev
1872, The Russian scientist who first organized elements into the periodic table, organized by atomic mass, because not all elements had been discovered, he left spaces for ones that will be found in the future.
Henry Moseley
1913, British scientist who built off Mendeleev's work, organized them by atomic number into the table we use today, this was considered better because isotopes were later discovered.
Antoine Lavosier
French scientist who created the law of conservation of mass, a rule that si used when balancing chemical equations.