ANTOINE LAVOISIER

ANTOINE LAVOISIER

• son of a famous Parisian lawyer
• attended law school & earned a degree
• his real passion was for science
• a true child of the enlightenment
• he was a political and social liberal

PERSUIT OF SCIENCE

• elected to attend the Acadamy of Sciences at age 25
• interest in geology at first
• bought into the Ferme Général
• married a "tax farmer's" daughter ( Marie-Anne Pierrette Paulze, 14)
• she dedicated her life to helping him, learned English to translate

THE CHEMICAL REVOLUTION

• Lavoisier took up residence in the Paris Arsenal after being appointed:
• Commissioner of the Royal Gunpowder and Saltpeter Administration
• beliefs about chemistry before this time were ancient at best
• chemistry had been synonymous with greek philosophy.

PHLOGISTON

• a dominant chemical concept of the time
• it seemed to explain so much in a simple fashion.
• developed by German scientist Georg Ernst Stahl early in the 18th century
• Phlogiston: comes from the Greek word for inflammable
• Lavoisier was introduced to this concept by Guillaume Franåois Rouelle

DEBUNKING PHLOGISTEM

• Antoine Lavoisier was one of the first to realize:
• combustion actually involved air.
• after many experiments, Lavoisier concluded two things...
• 1. there was a part of air that supported respiration/combustion
• 2. there was a part of air, and asphyxiant, that did neither

LAVOISIER'S THEORY OF COMBUSTION

• Lavoisier repeated other scientist's experiments, i.e. Henry Cavendish
• Henry Cavendish discovered that condensation of air forms water
• Cavendish was a phlogistonist, and Lavoisier disagreed with him
• In June, 1783, Lavoisier reacted oxygen with the "inflammable air"
• he concluded water was not an element but a compound of oxygen

LAVOISIER'S NEW CHEMISTRY

• this new system of chemistry spread more widely than anticipated
• Antoine wrote the Traité élémentaire de Chimie, published in 1789
• explained the influence of heat on element's reactions along with:
• acids and bases, the nature of gasses, and chemistry equipment
• Antoine Lavoisier revolutionized the way people thought of chemistry

LAW OF MASS CONSERVATION

• The Law of the Conservation of Mass states that:
• matter can be changed from one form into another
• mixtures can be seperated or made
• pure substances can be decomposed
• but, the total amount of mass remains constant

BIBLIOGRAPHY

• https://www.chem.wisc.edu/deptfiles/genchem/sstutorial/Text1/Tx14/tx14.html
• http://www.acs.org/content/acs/en/education/whatischemistry/landmarks/lavoi...
• http://www.chemheritage.org/discover/online-resources/chemistry-in-history/...
• http://www.mi.mun.ca/users/edurnfor/1100/atomic%20structure/tsld004.htm
• Ingenious Persuits: BUilding the Scientific Revolution, by Lisa Jardine (published 1999)