Werner Kuhn
Werner Kuhn ( born February 6, 1899 in Maur at Greifensee, † August 27 1963 in Basel) was a Swiss physical chemist.
Life and scientific work
Werner Kuhn studied from 1917 at ETH Zurich Chemistry and received his diploma in 1921 as an engineer - chemist. In 1923 he received his doctorate with a thesis on the photochemical decomposition of ammonia. He then worked for two years as a Rockefeller Fellow in Copenhagen under Niels Bohr with investigations of absorption bands of molecules. In 1927, Werner Kuhn habilitated at the University of Zurich with a thesis on the strength of the anomalous dispersion in vapors of potassium, thallium and cadmium. From 1927 to 1930, he then worked at the University of Heidelberg under Karl Freudenberg with optically active substances. Emphasis here was the photochemical preparation of optically active compounds from the optically inactive materials. For a few months he moved to the nuclear physics laboratory of Ernest Rutherford to Cambridge, where he dealt with the emission and absorption of gamma quanta and thus similar studies such as Rudolf Mössbauer, whose work led to the Mössbauer effect later conducted.
From 1930 to 1936, Werner Kuhn Associate Professor in Karlsruhe. During this time, the focus of his research was the behavior of chain molecules in solutions, especially about coiling and uncoiling of the polymer in a flow. In 1936, he received a professorship at the University of Kiel and carried out further experiments on the photochemical generation of optically active substances through, but especially for the photochemical isotope separation. Important for the present isotope separation ultracentrifuge method also considerations to complement the centrifugal effect in the gas centrifuge by the counter-current principle, which he previously for the distillation in a thin pipe ( hairpin countercurrent principle ) were for the purpose of separating isotopes (eg extraction of heavy water ) was developed. This multiplication principle according to the Kuhn- Martin process today is the basis for industrial separation plants for uranium enrichment.
1939 Werner Kuhn followed a call to the University of Basel. During this time fell further work on the optical activity, a theory about the Earth's interior, where he ran it from the flow behavior of high polymers, and an artificial muscle model based on a polyacrylic acid gel.
1938 Kuhn published a textbook of physical chemistry. In 1955 he held the office of Rector of the University of Basel. During his tenure, Niels Bohr was awarded the title of honorary doctor in Basel. 1961 Kuhn was awarded the Marcel Benoist Prize.