William Ramsay Scientist
- Name : Ramsay
- Born : 1852
- Died : 1916
- Category : Science
- Finest Moment : Discovery of argon, in 1894.
Born 2 October in Glasgow, Ramsay was educated at Glasgow University. He became a student of the German analytical chemist Robert Bunsen (he of burner fame) at the University of Heidelberg in 1871. Initially, he was into drugs (investigation, not active participation), looking at the physiological action of alkaloids, which are complex compounds derived from plants. He became Professor of Chemistry at the University of Bristol, from 1880-87, then took the chair at the University of London, from 1887-1913.
It was while at London that the 'big break' came. It had been shown by Lord Rayleigh in the early 1890s, that one litre of pure nitrogen gas weighed 1.2505g. On the other hand, one litre of nitrogen gas generated from air, and following the removal of oxygen, carbon dioxide and water vapour, weighed 1.2572g, i.e. was slightly heavier. Obviously, Dr Watson, there is presumably something in the air which is heavier, and chemically unreactive. So Ramsay began a brilliant series of investigations.
In 1894 he took 'atmospheric' nitrogen, and removed the nitrogen chemically. He was left with a gas, about 1 per cent of the total volume of air, which he name argon, from the Greek word for lazy, or inactive. Through methods perfected by other experimenters, argon was soon available in larger volumes, allowing Ramsay to pursue his analyses with better accuracy.
Over the next few years, Ramsay and the chemist Morris Travers succeeded in isolating neon (the new one), krypton (the hidden one), and xenon (the alien one). He also discovered radon and identified helium. These six gases were called the inert gases, but in the 1960s it was found that xenon could in fact form compounds, so a more recent group name is the noble gases.
In 1903, Ramsay showed that helium, the lightest of these gases, is continually produced during the radioactive decay of radium, a finding which added considerably to the modern understanding of nuclear reactions. Neon, and other gases, are of course used in lighting technology, while radon seeps out of certain granitic rocks, and can build up to dangerous, cancer-inducing levels in houses. Those living in Dartmoor and around Aberdeen in particular will be aware of the need to ventilate basement spaces so as to avoid this risk to health.
Ramsay became a fellow of the Royal Society in 1888, was knighted in 1902, and receive the Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 1904. He died on 23 July 1916, at High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire.