Johann Georg Anton Geuther

Johann Georg Anton Geuther ( born April 23 1833 in Neustadt bei Coburg, † August 23, 1889 in Jena ) was a German chemist.

His father, Christian Friedrich Geuther, was a master weaver, brewer and farmer. He first learned Weber and attended secondary school in Coburg and Saalfeld. After graduation in 1852 he began the study of natural sciences in Jena, moved to Berlin in 1853 and 1854 to Göttingen to Friedrich Wöhler and Wilhelm Weber. After receiving his doctorate in 1855 he became assistant and 1858 he habilitated as Privatdozent. In 1862 he became associate professor in Wöhler's laboratory and in the following year professor at the Chemistry Department in Jena. In 1865 he was rector of the university. In 1882 Hermann Thoms was one of his students.

He conducted research on the constitution of different double bonds and discovered the reduction of nitrobenzene to aniline. Circa 1856 he succeeded the deposition of chromium from chromic acid electrolyte. In 1862 he described with Friedrich Briegleb producing aluminum and magnesium nitride. In 1863 he developed a synthesis of ethyl acetoacetate and put nitrosamines dar. To In 1866 he developed with Johann Gustav Stickel a special method for the purification of lead seals. In his textbook of chemistry from 1870 he developed his own valence theory. He became an honorary member of the Chemical Society in London.