Happy Birthday Robert Bunsen!

Just a quick post to note that it’s Robert Bunsen’s birthday today. He’d be 201 years old if he were alive. If you’d like to learn a bit more about the burner named after this German chemist why not check out our Classic Kit entry on the Bunsen burner. If you want to learn a bit more about the man, rather than the burner, then we’ve got a whole feature on Robert Bunsen, who ought to be remembered for far more than this humble piece of lab equipment.

Part of what made Bunsen such a great chemist was his diverse interests and during his lifetime he was called upon to investigate volcanoes and geysers and the gases exiting blast furnaces (by today’s standards he was a bit cavalier with his safety and had to be rescued on one occasion when he was overcome by fumes and blew himself up on another occasion). He was a man driven by an insatiable curiosity and made contributions to electrochemistry, toxicology and spectroscopy, but perhaps his greatest passion was teaching. So let’s light a candle for him today.

Patrick Walter

                  

Source:
http://prospect.rsc.org/blogs/cw/?feed=rss2