Chemical Gallery

Mawsons Chemical Laboratory, c1908, (1909)

Mawson's Chemical Laboratory. The bottles were coated with ice by condensation from the warm, moist air of the hut, c1908, (1909). The frozen laboratory of expedition physicist Douglas Mawson. Anglo-Irish explorer Ernest Shackleton (1874-1922) made three expeditions to the Antarctic. During the second expedition, 1907-1909, he and three companions established a new record, Farthest South latitude at 88°S, only 97 geographical miles (112 statute miles, or 180 km) from the South Pole, the largest advance to the pole in exploration history. Members of his team also climbed Mount Erebus, the most active volcano in the Antarctic. Shackleton was knighted by King Edward VII for these achievements. He died during his third and last oceanographic and sub-antarctic expedition, aged 47. Illustration from The Heart of the Antarctic, Vol. I, by E. H. Shackleton, C.V.O. [William Heinemann, London, 1909]

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Joseph Louis Gay-Lussac, French physicist and chemist, 1848

Joseph Louis Gay-Lussac, French physicist and chemist, 1848. Gay-Lussac (1778-1850) made balloon ascents to investigate terrestrial magnetism and composition and characteristics of the atmosphere at different altitudes. He determined that the same volume of any gas will expand equally in response to the same increase in temperature. Amongst his achievements in chemistry were recognising iodine as a chemical element, and being one of the discoverers of the element boron. A photograph from Album de Photographies, Dans L'Intimite de Personnages Illustres, 1850-1950, Editions MD, 22 Rue de L'Arcade, Paris 8, 1850-1950

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Production of saltpetre (nitre, potassium nitrate, or KN03), 1683

Production of saltpetre (nitre, potassium nitrate, or KN03), 1683. Nitre beds, heaps of manure mixed with chalky earth. These were watered with urine and manure water. Calcium nitrate crystallised on the surface and was scraped off and taken to shed for processing. Saltpetre is the principal ingredient in gunpowder, and is still used in the preservation of some foods. In medicine it was used internally as a diuretic, but now is only used externally for a number of conditions, such as asthma. From a 1683 English edition of Beschreibung allerfurnemisten mineralischen Ertzt by Lazarus Ercker. (Prague, 1574)

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