Svante August Arrhenius the Founder of the Theory of Electrolytic Dissociation

February 18, 1911 SCIEN_TlfIC .AME RICAN 157

Svante August Arrhenius The Founder of the Theory of Electrolytic Dissociation

By Professor Wilhelm Ostwald

S VANTE AUGUST ARRHENIUS was born February a position in the new University of Stockholm, where German and British colleagues in this line of research. 19th, 1859, near Upsala. His ancestors were farm· his subsequent promotion to a professorship was due Arrhenius published a great many papers in the ers, and the name Arrhenius is a Latinized derivative mainly to the influence of foreign scientists. In ten years that followed the announcement of the dis of arena, meaning a river bank, the name of the family 1897, however, his colleagues chose him as their rec sociation theory. In the succeeding decade his duties estate in the south of Sweden. His father was super tor, or president, and he was twice re-elected to this as rector of the new university, to whic;h he deyoted intendent of grounds of the University of Upsala. At position, which he finally declined in the interest of himself with great diligence and success, diminished s c h 0 0 I Svante ex- his scientific output, hibited remarkable but two new and precocity and dis� very imp 0 r tan t tinguished himself phases of his activi particularly in math ty belong to this ematics, physics and period. biology. He entered In connection with the University 0 f his early studies of Upsala in 1876, but the conductivity of in 1881 went to Prof. solutions he had in Edlund in S t 0 c k vestigated electric holm. He attained conduction in silver the degree of doctor chloride in light .and of physics in 1884. in darkness, in phos His graduation the phorescent and ill';!. sis, "A Study of the minated air, and in Conductivity of Elec Bunse ll flames in trolytes," published which various s�lts in the same year, were vaporized. In made a profound im 1888 he studie:l t)e pression upon me. influence 0 f the I have devoted sun's rays on the part of my life to the electrical state of study of the chemi the atmosphere. In cal relation between 1895-8, in collabora acids and bases, and tion with Ekholm, when that paper ap he pub lish e d re peared, I had ob s earc h e son the tained for the spe moon's influence on cific affinities of au r 0 ras, thunder various acids values storms and terrestri closely a g r e e i n g al electricity, the 26- with the results day period of thun which Arrhenius had derstorms and auro reached by a very ras, and the effect different road. The produced 0 nth e method by which Ar· earth's temperature rhenius had attacked by the carbon diox and partly solved ide of the atmos the problem was far phere. In 1898, also, more comprehensive a p peared his re and fertile than my markable paper on own. I was then the effect of cosmi connected with the cal influences -upon polytechnical school physiological condi· of Riga, Russia, and tions, which has a:) there I repeated and parently been over· extended the experi looked by recent stu ments by which Ar dents of periodic vi rhenius had proved tal phenomena. the approximate pro In 1905 he aston portionality of the ished the scientific chemical affinities of world with his two acids and bases to volume Text Book the i I' electrolytical of Cosmical Physics, conductivities, anti cont ai n i ng many published the results. bold and original Then I went to Up ideas in regard to sala to support Ar the constitution and rhenius, whose views origin of the heaven were regarded as he ly bodies. Still more terodox, in obtain recently appeared ing a position in the "Worlds in the Mak university. A year ing," which exhibits later we worked to in a striking man gether for several n e r the author's months at Riga. characteristic traits, In 1887 Arrhenius independence and oublished his theory startling boldness of of electrolytic disso conception, the abili- ciation, probably the ty to regard appal" most important and prolific of his many achievements, his scientific work. In 1905 he became director of the ently disconnected facts from a common viewpoint, ,,,hich explained the observed anomalies in the free Nobel Physical Institute. and a masterly simplicity and comprehensiveness of ing point of electrolytes and interpreted as a disso- The theory of electrolytic dissociation soon gained result and statement. The most striking novelty in the cosmogony of Ar ciation factor the irrational coefficient (V - 1) in Van't so many enthusiastic young advocates that it con Hoff's then new and much discussed theory of osmotic tinued to develop without direct aid from the founder, rhenius is the introduction of the pressure of radia pressure. The new theory of electrolysis rapidly de· except where such aid was required to refute criticism tion, which appears to be a very active factor, not veloped, explaining many well known but little under and enlighten skeptics. In 1890 Arrhenius, Van't only in the formation of comets' tails, but also in stood phenomena of chemical equilibrium, analytical Hoff and I were invited to discuss the theory of solu many more important cosmical processes. reactions, the concentration of electrolytes, the gal tion with a committee of the British Association, the Arrhenius has recently taken up the study of vanic battery, the solubility of gases, etc. members of which were at least partially converted serum-therapy and has._ explained Ehrlich's important This rapid success spared Arrhenius the waste of to the new views by their foreign guests, aided by' discoveries by a theory of unsaturated compounds, energy in polemics which the iconoclast usually suf William Ramsay. The new theory made rapid pro analogous to that which exists between weak acids fers, and also assured him means of support and of gress against strong opposition in Great Britain. and bases.-Adapted from an article published in "Die further scientific activity. In 1891 he was called to French chemists refused to discuss or consider the Forderung des Tages," Leipzig, 1910. Akademische the University of Giessen, but he preferred to accept theory at that time and they are still far behind their Verlagsgesellschaft, m. b. H.