The History of Chemistry
Episodes
187 episodes
Bonus episode: Behind the Scenes
This episode explains how I create each episode of the podcast, from researching, to script-writing, recording, and editing.
Break Time
Dear Listener,I have been posting episodes weekly for two and a half years. I need a short break. I promise I will be back very soon. I have many more episodes already written and recorded for you. Please stay tuned. Until then….brave t...
1: Introduction to The History of Chemistry
This episode discusses the general theme of the podcast, its scope (from prehistory to the present), who I am, and the format of the series.
2: All Fired Up
This episode discusses examples of chemical change known to prehistoric humanity, from fire to fermentation, from annealing and smelting copper to glazing pottery, from heating ochre to change its color to the first use of bronze.
3: Metallica and More
We discuss the earliest historical practical chemistry, such as bronze, smelting iron, leather-working, mummification, salt as a preservative, dyes, soap, and even the ultimate origin of the word "chemistry". We have a special guest, Biblical H...
4: It's Elementary!
We discuss the first chemical theories, both Chinese and Greek, from ancient times, and some of the philosophers who argued about them.
5: The Rise of Khemeia
We talk about the rise of the mystical Egyptian art, "khemeia," in the Hellenistic Period through the Roman empire.
6: Arab Alchemy
This episode continues with the fall of the Roman Empire, sending the practitioners of Khemeia eastward. We learn of the rise of Arab Alchemy, the source of the word alchemy, and some of the major Arab alchemists: Geber and Al-Razi, We he...
7: European Alchemy
As Europeans interacted more with Arab traders, many more books of ancient and Arab alchemy filtered into Europe. We learn about advances in glass, discovery of alcohol, gunpowder, mineral acids. We discuss a number of famous European alchemist...
8: The Decline of Alchemy
The Age of Discovery included new science, but alchemy still lingered. We meet the scholars Agricola, Biringuccio, Paracelsus, and more, along with their writings. We learn of the discovery of Glauber's salt, van Helmont's biochemistry experime...
9: The First Chemists—Or Chymists?
In which we meet Angela Sala, who first described accurately a chemical synthesis, van Helmont and his research into gases, Torricelli and his barometer, and Robert Boyle, the "Sceptical Chymist", with a new definition of an "element." We meet ...
10: Phlogiston: A Burning Question
Here we see the advent of the steam engine, using the knowledge of Boyle's Law, invented by Thomas Savery. We encounter Johann Joachim Becher, with his three elemental earths, including a fatty earth that burned. Then we learn of Georg Ernst St...
11: Love is Like Oxygen
We continue with research by Joseph Black, Henry Cavendish, and Joseph Priestley, concerning new "airs". Then there is the work by Karl Scheele, which was delayed being published, and Mikhail Lomonosov, which was generally ignored. Finally we r...
12: Revolution’s Aftermath
What happened to Joseph Priestley and Marie-Anne plus Antoine Lavoisier? What were the immediate effects of Lavoisier’s new chemistry? We discuss how quickly the new chemistry was accepted, with some evidence in Elizabeth Fulhame’s book, plus t...
13: Up and Atom!
John Dalton, a Quaker from northern England, was a color-blind scientist. He presented his atomic theory that finally began to make sense to natural philosophers. He also invented a series of symbols for the elements, and created the first tabl...
14: Berzelius
In which we discuss Jöns Jakob Berzelius and his work. We also take a short detour to hear what US Presidents John Adams and Thomas Jefferson thought about chemistry. We mention the first female Swedish chemist, Anna Sundström. We continue with...
15: It's Organic
We reach the beginning of the branch of chemistry called Organic Chemistry. How did organic chemistry differ from inorganic chemistry? Can chemists make organic compounds, or is that restricted only to living creatures? We learn about Friedrich...
16: You're Not My Type
We learn about radical theory and type theory in organic chemistry of the 2nd quarter of the 19th century, and the battle between old stalwart Berzelius and the upstart chemists Gerhardt and Laurent. There is a bit of political history from Jap...
17: Electrochemistry
We learn about Jane Marcet, one of the most popular science writers of the 1800s, and her connection to Michael Faraday, one of the most brilliant experimental scientists and demonstrators of the 1800s, as well as Faraday's investigations into ...
18: Ouroboros
Edward Frankland realizes that there are specific valences for atoms. Archibald Scott Couper and August Kekulé simultaneously realize that specific atoms bond to specific other atoms in molecules, particularly carbon with valence 4, and inv...
19: Molecules in 3D
...in which we learn how polarized light helped Louis Pasteur to determine that internal three-dimensional structure of molecules was real based on "optical isomers." We then move to the 1870s, and see how van 't Hoff and Le Bel independently c...
20: The Element of Surprise
The problem of the large and growing variety of elements perplexed chemists, who attempted to bring order to the chaos. We learn about Döbereiner's triads, Pettenkofer and Dumas's correlations of multiples of atomic weights, Newlands's Law of O...