William Francis Hillebrand

William Francis Hillebrand ( born December 12, 1853 in Honolulu, † 1925) was a German chemist and mineralogist.

Life

William Francis Hillebrand was the son of the physician and botanist William Hillebrand.

After studying chemistry at the Freiberg Hillebrand earned his doctorate at the University of Heidelberg. He discovered that upon dissolution of uranium ores escapes a gas which he identified by spectroscopic methods as nitrogen. Only years later William Ramsay proved that it is the gas is known from the solar spectrum helium. Through an exchange of letters between Ramsay and Hillebrand is known that the uraninite used by Hillebrand unlike the cleveite used by Ramsay contains up to 10 % gaseous nitrogen. This fact is a possible explanation for the incorrect interpretation by Hillebrand.

Hillebrand was active in the American Chemical Society ( ACS) and from 1908 at the National Bureau of Standards as chief chemist.

After studying in Germany, he went in 1880 in the USA, where he headed the chemical laboratory of the United States Geological Survey in Denver. His first assistant was Antony Guyard. From 1908 to 1925 he was chief chemist at the National Bureau of Standards.

From 1923 he was with Gustav Ernst Fredrik Lundell, Applied Inorganic author of the analysis. The work was published after his death in 1929 and has long been the bible of inorganic chemistry.

During his time as a chemist at the United States Geological Survey, he analyzed many minerals and rocks, including some rare and new minerals. Its known careful and detailed analysis have led to the discovery of several chemical elements in rocks that are not suspected there before. For analyzes of the mineral uraninite ( pitchblende ), he discovered to his surprise, a gas consisting primarily of nitrogen. Hillebrand applies, for Zunyit as describer.

Works

• The Analysis of silicate and carbonate rocks. Analysis of silicate and carbonate rocks. Engelmann, Leipzig 1910. ( German ) Dt. Ed / by Ernst Wilke - Dörfurt. 2nd edition - Digitized edition of the University and State Library Dusseldorf

Honors

• The mineral described in 1908 by Fred Eugene Wright was named hillebrandite after him.
• In 1916, he was honored for his services from Columbia University with the Chandler Gold Medal.
• The American Chemical Society of Washington awarded today the annual Hillebrand Prize ( Hillebrand Medal ).