MICHEL

See also:

• EUGENE

EUGENE

See also:

• MICHEL EUGENE CHEVREUL (1786-1889)

CHEVREUL (1786-1889)  , French chemist, was born, on the 31st of August 1786, at Angers, where his father was a physician . At about the age of seventeen he went to Paris and entered L . N . Vauquelin's chemical laboratory, afterwards becoming his assistant at the natural history museum in the Jardin des Plantes . In 1813 he was appointed professor' of chemistry at the Lycee Charlemagne, and subsequently under-took the directorship of the Gobelins tapestry works, where he carried out his researches on colour contrasts (De la loi du contraste simultane des couleurs, 1839) . In 1826 he became a member of the Academy of Sciences, and in the same year was elected a foreign member of the Royal Society of London, whose Copley medal he was awarded in 1857 . He succeeded his master, Vauquelin, as professor of organic chemistry at the natural history museum in 1830, and thirty-three years later assumed its directorship also; this he relinquished in 1879, though he still retained his professorship . In 1886 the completion of his hundredth year was celebrated with public rejoicings; and after his death, which occurred in Paris on the 9th of April 18891 he was honoured with a public funeral . In 1901 a statue was erected to his memory in the museum with which he was connected for so many years . His scientific work covered a wide range, but his name is best known for the classical researches he carried out on animal fats, published in 1823 (Recherches sur les corps Bras d'origine animale) . These enabled him to elucidate the true nature of soap; he was also able to discover the composition of stearin and olein, and to isolate stearic and oleic acids, the names of which were invented by him . This work led to important improvements in the processes of candle-manufacture .

Chevreul was a determined enemy of charlatanism in every form, and a complete sceptic as to the " scientific " psychical research or spiritualism which had begun in his time (see his De la baguette divinatoire, et des tables tournantes, 1864) .