Volume 83, No.1, January 2019 - ISSN 0110-5566 (Print) ISSN 2624-1161 (Online) - NZ Institute of Chemistry
←
→
Page content transcription
If your browser does not render page correctly, please read the page content below
ISSN 0110-5566 (Print) ISSN 2624-1161 (Online) Volume 83, No.1, January 2019
Published on behalf of the New Zealand Institute of Chemistry in January, April, July and October.
The New Zealand Institute of Chemistry Publisher
Incorporated Rebecca Hurrell
PO Box 13798 Email: rebeccajhurrell@gmail.com
Johnsonville
Wellington 6440 Advertising Sales
Email: nzic.office@gmail.com Email: rebeccajhurrell@gmail.com
Printed by Graphic Press
Editor
Dr Catherine Nicholson Disclaimer
C/- BRANZ, Private Bag 50 908 The views and opinions expressed in Chemistry in New
Porirua 5240 Zealand are those of the individual authors and are
not necessarily those of the publisher, the Editorial
Phone: 04 238 1329 Board or the New Zealand Institute of Chemistry.
Mobile: 027 348 7528 Whilst the publisher has taken every precaution to
Email: catherine.nicholson@branz.co.nz ensure the total accuracy of material contained in
Chemistry in New Zealand, no responsibility for errors
or omissions will be accepted.
Consulting Editor
Emeritus Professor Brian Halton Copyright
School of Chemical and Physical Sciences The contents of Chemistry in New Zealand are subject
Victoria University of Wellington to copyright and must not be reproduced in any
PO Box 600, Wellington 6140 form, wholly or in part, without the permission of the
Publisher and the Editorial Board.
Email: brian.halton@vuw.ac.nz
On the cover: Mendeleev’s handwritten version of the periodic law, based on atomic weight and chemical resemblance. The
United Nations have designated 2019 the International Year of the Periodic Table of Chemical Elements. It marks 150 years since
Mendeleev’s first table. See article by Brian Halton, page 12.
Contents
Volume 83, No.1, January 2019
Articles and features
12 Periodicity and approaches to periodic classification
Brian Halton
20 Arranging the elements creatively: alternative forms of the periodic table
Maulik Mungalpara, Joel Cornelio
23 Mendeleev’s music: notes on the periodic table
Peter Hodder
30 Luminescence in metal-organic frameworks: origin and applications
Joel Cornelio
34 Catalytic coordination cages
Rebecca Severinsen, Paul G. Plieger
37 Defective dicubane review
Sidney S. Woodhouse, Paul G. Plieger
40 Chemistry revisited in Canterbury
John Blunt, Rosie Ibbotson, Robin Mann, John Packer, Naomi van den Broek
43 A tribute to Brian Halton
Martin Banwell
Other columns
2 From the President 45 Obituary: Alan George Langdon
3 January news 46 Book review
44 Obituary: Keith Andrew Hunter
1
Chemistry in New Zealand January 2019
Comment from the President
From the President
Welcome to the New Year and the first issue of Chemis-
try in New Zealand for 2019. It is an honour to serve as
the President of the Institute for the next two years and
I hope I am able to continue the excellent work of the
past two Presidents, James Crowley (2018) and Penny
Brothers (2017). As you will know from previous editions
of Chemistry in New Zealand when Penny was President,
she advocated for a change from a one year to a two year
term for the President. This rule change was voted in at
the 2017 AGM and therefore it is an honour to hold the
first two year presidential role. The NZIC Council hope
that the new two year term for the President will allow
for better continuity of leadership within the NZIC and
allow the President, along with Council, to be more pro-
ductive for you, the members.
2018 saw Joanna Dowle join us as our new administrator
and it has been a pleasure working with her on various
projects. I look forward to more collaboration in 2019 and
beyond. Joanna replaced Richard Rendle and we will see
another big change on Council with the retirement of Co-
lin Freeman as our Institute treasurer. Colin has worked
tirelessly for many years keeping our books in order, au-
culminate at our NZIC national conference, NZIC XIX, to
diting the branch accounts and generally ensuring that
be held in Christchurch from 24-28 November 2019. As
we have funds to continue operating. On behalf of the
conference chair I look forward to welcoming all of you
Institute I thank Colin for his years of hard work and ser-
to Canterbury and Christchurch for a fantastic conference
vice to NZIC and wish him well for whatever he takes on
celebrating all aspects of Chemistry in New Zealand and
next. We expect a new treasurer to be announced soon.
beyond.
I hope by now that you have all had a chance to explore
Sarah Masters
the new website, development of which was driven by
Paul Plieger. The new website has modernised our sub- NZIC President
scription model, moving from paper and mail to an on-
line system for membership and membership renewals.
Biographical Note
If you have not had a chance to explore the website then
I encourage you to do so, and, if you have suggestions Sarah Masters is an Associate Professor at the Univer-
regarding content then please let myself or Joanna know. sity of Canterbury. She obtained her BSc(Hons) and PhD
from the University of Edinburgh under the guidance of
There will be plenty happening this year for members Professor David Rankin (1997 – 2001). In 2005 she was
to get involved with. As part of the celebration of the awarded the prestigious Royal Society of Edinburgh/BP
centenary of IUPAC in 2019, you are invited to join in a Fellowship (2005-2010), only one of which was awarded
Global Women’s Breakfast. The event is titled “Empower- every two years, to carry out research on gas phase mo-
ing Women in Chemistry: A Global Networking Event”. It lecular structure. She started her independent academic
will be held on a single day – 12 February. The aim of this career at the University of Canterbury, Department of
event is to assist women chemists to expand their net- Chemistry in 2011 and has since moved through the
work of contacts, both locally and internationally. Women ranks to Associate Professor (2019). Her major research
at different stages of their individual careers can inform interests are in gas and fluid phase molecular structure
each other about their career progress, and together ex- determination, utilising the combined power of experi-
plore opportunities, in professional development and in mental and computational methods. Sarah has been
research or teaching horizons. Various branches are get- on the NZIC Canterbury Branch Committee since 2013,
ting organised with a breakfast event, and I hope that served as Canterbury Branch Chairperson (2015 – 2018)
you will be able to come along and support this, as we and has sat on the National Council since 2016.
celebrate in New Zealand before handing over to Austra-
lia, initiating a handshake around the world! 2019 is also
the 150th anniversary of Dmitri Mendeleev’s first report
of the periodic table. We have various events planned for
the year including a schools competition, element of the
week discussion on Radio New Zealand and collaboration
with the Science-Technology Roadshow. The events will
2
Chemistry in New Zealand January 2019
New Zealand Institute of Chemistry
News
supporting chemical sciences
January News
NZIC News invited speaker at international sym- Events
posia. She has contributed to the
Royal Society Te Aparangi next generation of scientists through Courses and Careers Day
Fellows her post-graduate teaching and has
In August 2018, Courses and Careers
Professors Cather Simpson and Em- served with distinction in leadership
Day was very well attended, with
ily Parker have been elected as new roles in national and trans-Tasman
most of our lectures being full or
Fellows of the Royal Society Te Apa- scientific organisations.
almost full – indeed, parents were
rangi. asked to leave Margaret Brimble’s
Chemistry jobs on NZIC
medicinal chemistry lecture so that
Cather is internationally renowned website
more potential students could at-
for her contributions to fundamen- NZIC is launching a chemistry jobs tend. James Wright introduced our
tal new knowledge about how light page on our website (nzic.org.nz/ new Green Chemical Science spe-
interacts with matter. A Professor of chemistry-jobs/). This page aims to cialisation. He gave an excellent
Physics and Chemistry at the Univer- collate available chemistry jobs and description of many of the environ-
sity of Auckland, her research has openings in New Zealand. It is for any mental issues that we as scientists
achieved seminal insight into multi- advertisements for open positions or could address and examples of steps
disciplinary areas ranging from ul- jobs relating to the field of chemis- already being taken before describ-
trafast dynamics of heme proteins, try, including chemistry PhD schol- ing the new major, stressing its inter-
laser-generated force on sperm, and arships and postdoc appointments. disciplinary nature. The Food Science
laser beam-shaping to transform This service is free for current NZIC and Nutrition information talks and
materials at the microscale. She also members, otherwise the cost is $50 table organised by Peter Swedlund
applies that research to address im- per advertisement. and Clare Wall were also very well
portant practical challenges, and
attended, with the smoothie bike an
thereby generates transformative If you have a job opening, a PhD
extra drawcard. Thank you to Malini
impact through both. Since 2012, she scholarship or a postdoc position
Arewgoda and Sue Western for or-
has delivered 11 plenary and keynote available, please send your ad (in-
ganising the day, and to Jon Sperry,
lectures and garnered $23.9m in ex- cluding any images or external links)
Malini Arewgoda, David Salter, Kai-
ternal research funding as principal to nzic.office@gmail.com to be fea-
tlin Beare, James Wright, Matthew
investigator. She is founding inventor tured on the jobs page.
Sullivan and Shi-Wei Kim for giving
in two science startup companies, in-
advice at the SCS stands. Thanks also
cluding Silicon Valley award-winner The University of Auckland
to all the graduate students and staff
Engender. In 2016, she was Kiwinet’s
Baldwins Researcher Entrepreneur
Welcome who performed demonstrations, in-
cluding Ayesha Zafar, Bikimi Bitrus,
and BNZ Supreme winner, and a Welcome to Lynette Carter as the
Dianna Truong, Mejo Remanan, Roy
Ministry of Primary Industries Cham- new Chemistry Facilities Coordinator
Lai, Sneh Patel, Sunandita Ghosh,
pion. Stellar outreach and teaching, and John Lau as the Group Services
Ravnit Singh, Faith Huang, Anna
including a National Teaching Excel- Coordinator.
Worthington and Andy Wang.
lence award, complement her excep-
tional research strengths. Farewell
Faculty Postgraduate Research
Emily has made a sustained contri- We said goodbye to Sue Western Showcase 2018
bution to the understanding of en- in October 2018, who has been our
Commencing on 10 September
zyme function at the molecular and Group Services Coordinator (GSC) for
2018, the exciting week-long event
organism level. This new knowledge the year since Anoma was seconded
featured postgraduate posters dis-
has been applied to the design and to a team leader role. The GSC is a
played across the ground floors of
synthesis of enzyme inhibitors as po- critical role in the School, ensuring
the science buildings, opportunities
tential drugs, especially antibiotics. staff and GTAs get hired and paid,
to hear about research from stu-
It has also led to the use of enzymes organising travel, organising events,
dents, people’s choice voting and
as tools in the manufacture of valu- and generally being the point person
other competitions. This showcase
able bioactive compounds. Based for staff and graduate students. We
provided an excellent opportunity
in the Ferrier Research Institute at thank Sue very much for her
for research students to present
Victoria University of Wellington, contributions and wish her well in
their research to their peers and the
her research has been published her future roles.
University of Auckland staff and stu-
extensively in high quality scientific dent community.
journals and she has been a regular
3
Chemistry in New Zealand January 2019
Renaming the Faculty of Science third-year students an introduction entitled, The technological future of
on the 125th anniversary of to postgraduate study. Sue and Hay- quantum dots: is it golden, or do they
Women’s Suffrage in New ley are also acknowledged for their have a silver lining?
Zealand assistance with the event. We had
over 30 students attend the post- On 24 September 2018, Profes-
On 19 September 2018 the Faculty graduate introduction, and many of sor Mary Garson, University of
of Science honoured many women them indicated they were very inter- Queensland, presented a talk en-
after whom the Faculty, together ested in studying with us next year. titled, Game of terpenes: structures,
with its Schools and Departments, stereochemistry and chemical ecol-
are named. We were the Joyce, Lady BASF Kidslab ogy of nudibranch metabolites.
Waters School of Chemical Sciences
Thank you to all staff and students On 19 October 2018, Dr Tim Alli-
within the Dame Charmian O’Connor
who were involved in the BASF Kid- son from the School of Physical and
Faculty of Science. Three of the
slab in November, especially Katrina Chemical Sciences, University of
honourees were present in person
Graaf for leading the event and Peter Canterbury gave a NZIC sponsored
– Dame Charmian O’Connor, Joyce,
Swedlund who did presentations and seminar entitled, Revealing the di-
Lady Waters, and Vivienne Cassie-
demonstrations for all 6 sessions. The rect action of a chemical chaperone
Cooper – while the son of Dame Mira
following people were part of the using native mass spectrometry.
Szaszy also attended and read out
wonderful team that made BASF kid-
part of his mother’s biography. Both Congratulations
slab so successful in 2018 - Technical
Charmian and Joyce spoke very well,
staff: Sandra Otty, Selina Yang (who
with Charmian noting that the event Congratulations to Dr Leandro Dias
helped with preparation and all three
marked the leadership, courage, and Araujo (Wine Science) and Jessica
days of Kidslab followed by cleanup),
determination to achieve exhibited Suda (PhD, Food Science) on the
also Stuart Morrow, Pooja Yadav and
by the honourees. Charmian also birth of their son Enzo.
Albina Avzalova who helped with
commented that there is still work to
some sessions; Postgraduate stu- Congratulations to Dr Jóhannes
be done to attain gender equity; that
dents: Dianna Truong, Taniela Lolo- Reynisson and his research group &
there should be no need to comment
hea, Andrew Earl, Kyriakos Varnava, collaborators (Dr Lisa Pilkington, As-
on Margaret Brimble’s gender when
Rasangi Sabaragamuwa, Roy Lai, sociate Professor Yacine Hemar and
describing her election as a Fellow of
Megan Jamieson, Matthew Sullivan, Distinguished Professor Margaret
the Royal Society, and that Charmian
Shi Min Tan, Luis Camacho, Joseph Brimble) for their paper, A chemo-
was waiting on the selection of the
Vella, Xiaotong Lyu, Mohinder Naiya, metric analysis of compounds from
first female(s) as Head of the School
Kirsty Anderson, Jessica Liyu, Reuben native New Zealand medicinal flora
of Chemical Sciences, Dean of Sci-
White, Courtney Davy, Jinal Patel, Bi- that was published in Chemistry – An
ence, and Vice Chancellor of the Uni-
kimi Bitrus; Office staff: huge thanks Asian Journal. It was featured in Stuff
versity of Auckland. Joyce was the
to Anna-Marie Simcock who did all News.
second female PhD graduate from
the background organising with the
the Department of Chemistry (the Congratulations to Buzhe Wu, a PhD
schools, doing the P-card orders and
first being June Sutor in 1953) and student in Margaret Brimble’s group
staff to make sure we had the chil-
she says about her first job in Eng- with Paul Harris, whose paper in the
dren here in the first place (!) and
land (at ICI): “Jobs for women were RSC flagship journal Chemical Sci-
John Lau for the contracts and being
not favoured in industry but I was ence has been selected as the paper
Anna-Marie’s back up.
fortunate that someone had been for “Pick of the Week”. The paper
appointed to a position as a crystal- It takes a variety of people to make resulted from a collaboration with
lographer but he was unable to take this event happen. At UoA we are Robert Keyzers at Victoria University.
it up immediately and I was appoint- very lucky to have such dedicated
ed to temporarily fill the gap.” Joyce staff and GTAs that get behind the Congratulations to Mahsa Motshak-
was the first female President of the outreach activities and are so enthu- eri for winning the best poster prize
NZ Institute of Chemistry. She was siastic and passionate about educat- for the Symposium on Nanomateri-
appointed to the Physical Sciences ing the children that science is fun. als for electroanalytical chemistry
committee for the Foundation for The team were complimented many and electroanalytical tools for study-
Research, Science and Technology, times by the teachers and BASF staff ing nanomaterials at the 69th Annual
which was set up in 1990 to allocate about how wonderful they are. Meeting of the International Society
science funding in NZ, and she was of Electrochemistry, held in Bologna,
the only woman appointed to the Visitors Italy, 2-7 September 2018. Mahsa’s
first PBRF Physical Sciences panel in poster was chosen from 68 posters
On 3 September 2018, Dr David Lunn
2003. presented in this Symposium, and
from OxSyBio in Oxford, UK gave a
she received a prize of 300 Euros (M.
Oktoberfest seminar entitled, Biofabrication of
Motshakeri, J. Travas-Sejdic, A.R.J.
artificial tissues for diagnostic and
A very big thank you to Tilo Sohnel Phillips and P.A. Kilmartin, Electro-
therapeutic applications.
and his group for putting on a very chemical and HPLC analysis of milk
successful Oktoberfest and thank On 7 September 2018, Dr Marcus uric acid with minimum interference
you also to Viji Sarojini for giving our Jones from AUT presented a talk from ascorbic acid).
4
Chemistry in New Zealand January 2019
Congratulations to the following staff Congratulations to Kaitlin Beare who Ivan Leung was successful with his
for successes in the 2018 MBIE fund- has been awarded a CLeaR SEED In- Fast Start application, Unravelling
ing round: novation in Teaching Grant for 2019. the structural and molecular basis of
Her project is titled, Auto-text analy- ethylene biosynthesis in plants which
Claude Aguergaray and Cather sis for just-in-time teaching, and aims was awarded $300,000.
Simpson: Point-of-care device: in- to develop tools for analysing stu-
stant prostate cancer diagnosis dent writing as part of formative as- John Sperry received a standard
sessment in large chemistry courses. Marsden grant of $888,000 for, Elec-
Margaret Brimble (with VUW/ Fer- trifying chemical synthesis, with Paul
rier Institute): Fungal factories: syn- An interview of Rebecca Deed talk- Kilmartin as AI.
thetic biology for the manufacture of ing about teaching the art of wine
high value products science and about our Wine Science Margaret Brimble and Paul Har-
Programme at the University of Auck- ris were associated with two
Margaret Brimble (with VUW/ Fer- grants. Margaret Brimble was PI on
land was featured on Radio New Zea-
rier Institute): Efficient drug develop- the $935,000 grant, Unleashing new
land in Oct 2018. Here’s the abstract:
ment from transition state theory generation lanthipeptides from na-
“You could say Rebecca Deed’s stel-
lar career in the science of wine was ture to combat antimicrobial resis-
Margaret Brimble (with Cawthron
more accidental than chosen. At sec- tance with AIs Ghader Bashiri, Paul
Institute): Rationally designing a
ondary school her preferred subjects Harris, and Deborah Williamson of
‘smart’ marine antifouling biocide
were English, History and French but the University of Melbourne. Paul
based on novel synthetic peptides
her tertiary studies led her onto an Harris was the PI on a $939,000
Congratulations to Distinguished entirely different path. At 33 she’s Marsden grant from the Cellular,
Professor Margaret Brimble who not just a lecturer in Wine Science Molecular and Physiological Biol-
was one of the Trailblazers fea- at Auckland University but also a na- ogy panel with the topic, Sweeten-
tured in the NZ Herald to mark the tional senior wine judge. She’s just ing biological therapeutics - chemical
125th anniversary of Women’s Suf- finished with the New World Wine synthesis of glycoprotein mimics with
frage in New Zealand. Awards and will later in the year be AIs Margaret Brimble, Sung Hyun
judging at the New Zealand Aromatic Yang, and Lyn Wise (Otago).
Congratulations to the 105 spring
Wine Competition in Christchurch. Paul Hume (now at VUW) received
graduates who received qualifica-
She talks about her unusual twists a $300,000 Fast Start grant for his
tions from the School of Chemical
while studying and how it’s led to her application, Next-generation small
Sciences either in person or in ab-
whole family holding their own tast- molecule acceptors for use in organic
sentia, including 9 PhD graduates, 21
ing competitions. She also has some solar cells with Geoff Waterhouse as
Masters graduates and 13 BSc(Hons)
tips for novice wine drinkers.” AI.
graduates. We joined the graduates,
their families and friends in celebrat- Margaret Brimble is one of the two Congratulations to the Hungry Hip-
ing this significant milestone in their New Zealand scientists featured in pos, who won the Best Scientific
lives. the book Profiles of women scien- Content and Best Display awards in
tists in Asia: their inspirational sto- the student product development
Congratulations to Andrew Chan (su-
ries, produced by the Association of competition at the International
pervisors Cather Simpson and Ben
Academies and Societies of Sciences Union of Food Science and Technolo-
Mallett) who was awarded first prize
in Asia. gy conference in Mumbai in October
in the Faculty Poster competition.
Juliet Gerrard was featured in the 2018. The team members were Anna
Congratulations to Roshan Khadka Worthington, Luodan Xu, Reeva-may
Na-tional Portrait section of
(Supervisors Jadranka Travas-Se- Hollick, Xiaoying Zhang, Xiaoying
stuff.co.nz, due to her new role
jdic and Andrew Kralicek) who was Guan and Ziting Xie. Their project
as the Prime Minister’s Chief
awarded the People’s Choice award was a fortified dry mix for traditional
Science Adviser.
for most engaging poster talk at the New Zealand Maori sourdough-style
Faculty of Science Postgraduate Re- Congratulations to Rakesh Arul, bread.
search Showcase in September 2018. from the Photon Factory, who was
award-ed a Cambridge-Rutherford Congratulations to Roshan Khadka,
Congratulations to team So Basic, a PhD student supervised by Pro-
Memo-rial PhD Scholarship.
consisting of Nina Novikova, Stuart fessor Jadranka Travas-Sejdic and
Morrow, Hannah Holtkamp, Andy Congratulations to Cather Simpson, Dr Andrew Kralicek (Plant and Food
Wang, Ben Mallett, and Thomas for being made a Fellow of the Royal Research), whose paper has been
Minniee, who won the Faculty of Sci- Society Te Aparangi. She was recently published in the highly pres-
ence Quiz Night. recog-nised for her contributions to tigious Biosensors and Bioelectronics
funda-mental studies of the journal. Part of his supplementary
Congratulations to Helen Morten
interaction of light with matter as data have also been published in an-
who gave birth to her second daugh-
well as for her applied and other journal - Data in Brief.
ter Lucie Ford on 24 September
commercial research.
2018. Isobel seems to be very proud Engender Technologies, a spinout
to be a big sister. Congratulations to all those from the Photon Factory led by
staffwho received Marsden Grants:
5
Chemistry in New Zealand January 2019
Cather Simpson, has been acquired al science approach to milk and dairy of the Health Science Academies
by CRV International, a co-operative systems. at James Cook, De La Salle, Onehu-
of 27,000 dairy and beef farmers, nga, Auckland Girls Grammar and
for an undisclosed sum. Engender Dr Marcus Jones gave invited talks Waitakere High Schools. The event
was co-founded by Cather, seed in- at both the University of Auckland involved hands-on activities from
vestment firm Pacific Channel and and the University of Otago entitled, the chemistry, food science and mi-
Auckland UniServices in 2011. It has The technological future of quantum crobiology departments at AUT and
developed a novel laser technology dots: is it golden or does it have a sil- was assisted by the fantastic help of
that investigates and can separate ver lining? many AUT technical, academic and
X- and Y-bearing bull sperm cells. It teaching staff.
Dr Cameron Weber gave an invited
is intended that Engender’s staff will
talk at the University of Otago en- Professor Allan Blackman and Dr
remain in New Zealand retaining a
titled, All for one or one for all? Ionic Jack Chen kicked off an AUT Careers
strong research relationship with
liquid mixtures and nanostructured Day at Auckland Grammar School
UoA.
ionic liquids as neoteric solvents. with Chemistry with a Bang! high-
Congratulations to PhD candidates lighting chemistry as a fascinating
Professor Nicola Brasch gave a semi-
Ben Daniels and Chloe Cho who suc- area of study and its contributions to
nar sponsored by the Dodd-Walls
cessfully presented and defended society.
Centre at Victoria University of Wel-
their theses. Ben’s thesis was en-
lington entitled, Probing the mecha- Members of the School of Science at
titled, Total synthesis of lumazine-
nisms of nitroxyl release from photo- AUT assisted the University of Auck-
containing compounds (supervised
active Piloty’s acid derivatives. land with organising the FYSEC (First
by Distinguished Professor Margaret
Brimble). He worked with Comvita Year Science Educators) Colloquium
Dr Jack Chen and Dr Cameron Weber
identifying biomarkers to authenti- held at both universities on 3-4 De-
organised a Science Sizzler event at
cate NZ manuka honey. Chloe’s the- cember 2018. FYSEC is a forum for
AUT in September for approximately
sis was entitled, Structure-activity tutors and lecturers from tertiary in-
120 Year 10 students who are part
relationships of guanidinylated bio- stitutions and high schools to explore
degradable antimicrobial polycar-
bonates (supervised by Dr Jianyong
Jin and Distinguished Professor Mar-
garet Brimble) and was funded by
the MBIE Biocide Tool Box Research
programme.
Auckland University of
Technology
New Faces
We welcome a new PhD student,
Ravi Allam, who will be working with
Dr Jack Chen.
Events and Invited Talks
AUT hosted an NZIC seminar by Dr
Yacine Hemar, Riddett Institute and
Jiangnan University entitled, Materi- Students at the Science Sizzler
AUT Careers Day at Auckland Grammar
6
Chemistry in New Zealand January 2019
the challenges of teaching first-year
science.
Congratulations
Dr Marcus Jones has been appointed
as an Associate Investigator of the
Dodd-Walls Centre.
Dr Cameron Weber has successfully
obtained a Marsden Fast Start grant
for the project Structure and reactiv-
ity in nanostructured ionic solvents
worth $300,000 as Principal Inves-
tigator. Cameron is also a Key Re-
searcher on a $10M MBIE Research
Programme Grant led by Scion enti-
Winners of the Trivia and Truffles quiz: Three Brits and a Bryce
tled, Bark biorefinery: unlocking new
hydrophobic polymers and moun-
tains of wealth.
Dr Jack Chen published an article in
Angewandte Chemie entitled, Sub-
strate‐induced self‐assembly of co-
operative catalysts, together with
students Pablo Solis Munana and
Chloe Zhijun Ren. This work was sup-
ported by a Catalyst: Seeding grant.
PhD students of Professor Nicola
Brasch, Dominique Rwizinkindi and
Vinay Bharadwaj, have been award-
ed a Dodd-Walls PhD scholarship and
a Dodd-Walls travel grant respective-
ly to present at the IONS Conference
on Optics, Atoms, and Laser Applica- The second-placed team: CHONK
tions (IONS KOALA) in Sydney.
CANTERBURY
Trivia and Truffles
The Canterbury branch of the NZIC
held its annual Trivia and Truffles
quiz at the University of Canterbury
Club on 19 November. Eleven teams
competed for the various prizes on
offer, with rounds on moles, mu-
sic, food and drink, sport and The
Chase to name a few. A great effort
from all the teams, with lots of fun
and some very witty answers. Peer
marking also resulted in some co-
lourful feedback for the teams. The The third-placed team: Hey everyone! Just here to beat CHONK
winning team were Three Brits and
a Bryce (Bryce Williamson, Antony ond! Ohm sweet Ohm won the best University of Canterbury
Fairbanks, Dan Foley and Alison Fol- team name while The International
He Puna Pūtaiao UC Science pro-
ey), second were C H O N K (Sarah Team came last and got a small prize
gramme.
Lilley, Ben Howard, Daniel Smith and for their efforts. Well done all and a
Colm Healy), and third were Hey ev- great evening of fun was had. A six week UC Science programme,
eryone! Just here to beat C H O N K He Puna Pūtaiao was held for Year 10
The well attended NZIC Winter
(Nic Bason, Zach Stueven, Lily Her- Māori students that engages them
Warmer was held on 23 August with
manspahn, Nathan Harvey-Reid). in the culture of science by involv-
mulled wine and mince pies.
Pity the third team didn’t finish sec- ing them in scientific research. Us-
7
Chemistry in New Zealand January 2019
ing the context of water quality in South Wales Southern Highlands Bernhard Auer, Nisansala Bandara,
Te Waihora (Lake Ellesmere), the Conference on Heterocyclic Chem- Sam Brooke, Joel Cornelio, Omid
students are mentored by University istry in August and the second at Taheri and Jin Wong attended the
of Canterbury scientists in literature Organic 18: RACI Organic Division MacDiarmid Annual Symposium at
reviews and collecting and analysing National Conference in December, the University of Auckland between
data in the field, before presenting held at the University of Western 21 - 23 November. Omid Taheri pre-
their findings both in e-book format Australia. sented his work on Metal-organic
and as a research poster displayed frameworks for gas separation and
at a Pō Whakanui at the end of the Marilyn Anderson of La Trobe Uni- Sam Brooke spoke on Investigation
programme. versity, Melbourne gave a seminar of edges of MoS2 nanostructures us-
on Production of peptide pharma- ing Raman and X-ray spectroscopies.
Lectures ceuticals in plants on 24 November. A
seminar on Direct electricity produc-
Royal Society of Chemistry and tion from algae, bacteria and plants
OTAGO
the New Zealand Institute of was given by Chris Howe of the Uni- The branch facilitated a tour of the
Chemistry lecture versity of Cambridge. Allpress coffee roastery in Dunedin
On the 26 September the Roy- on the afternoon of 2 November. 10
Vyacheslav Filichev attended the 10th
al Society of Chemistry and the coffee-loving NZIC members toured
International Conference on Porphy-
New Zealand Institute of Chemis- the roasting facilities and tasted sev-
rins and Phthalocyanines in Munich,
try Canterbury Branch presented eral different varieties of beans and
Germany. He gave an invited talk on
a lecture by Professor Mary J Gar- brewing techniques. It was an infor-
the session devoted to porphyrin as-
son, School of Chemistry and Mo- mative and stimulating afternoon
semblies on bioinspired templates.
lecular Biosciences, University of and the staff at Allpress are thanked
He visited Professor Guido Clever at
Queensland, Australia, entitled, for their enthusiastic tour guiding
TU Dortmund and gave a talk titled,
Game of Terpenes: Structures, ste- and Christina McGraw is thanked for
TINA-DNA assemblies in biomedical
reochemistry and chemical ecology organising the event.
and fluorescence applications.
of nudibranch metabolites.
In November, Harikrishnan Kurup, a University of Otago, School of
School of Physical and Chemical PhD student jointly supervised by Vy- Pharmacy
Sciences Te Kura Matū Seminar acheslav Filichev, Geoffrey Jameson
Sameek Singh and Andrea Vernall
Series and Elena Harjes successfully passed
attended the Medicinal Chemistry
his 1st year PhD confirmation.
On 10 October Shane Telfer, MacDi- and Chemical Biology Conference
armid Institute of Advanced Materi- Sam Brooke, Joel Cornelio, Hossein 18 - 21 November 2018, Brisbane,
als and Nanotechnology, Institute of Etemadi, Arka Gupta, Harikrishnan Queensland. Sameek presented a
Fundamental Sciences, Massey Uni- Kurup, Subo Lee, Liam McGarry, poster and Andrea gave a talk. Con-
versity, Palmerston North, presented Yangdong Su and Omid Taheri gave gratulations also to Sameek for grad-
the lecture Multicomponent metal- presentations on their research uating with his PhD.
organic frameworks. at the Massey-Victoria Chemistry
Symposium held at Victoria Univer- University of Otago, Department
MANAWATU sity, Wellington on 9 November. Arka of Chemistry
Gupta won the Best Presentation A huge congratulations to Nigel Lucas
In September, Dr Han Yin (Ben) Award and Liam McGarry’s presenta- for his successful Marsden proposal,
joined the Telfer group as a MacDi- tion was highly commended. Carbon nanocones by design: atomi-
armid funded post-doctoral fellow to
cally-precise molecular containers. In
work on multicomponent MOF mem-
branes. Matt Cowan of the Universi-
ty of Canterbury and Jianyong Jin of
the University of Auckland have been
collaborating with Shane Telfer on
gas sorption measurements. On 24
October, Matt gave a seminar on The
highest permeance CO2 membrane
ever made and other separation sto-
ries. Jianyong gave a talk on Synthesis
of polymers of intrinsic microporosity
on 12 November.
The Rowlands group welcomed Sha-
shank Tiwari as a new PhD student
in December. Gareth Rowlands gave
two talks recently - one at the New MacDiarmid Institute investigators, students and postdoctoral fellows from the Depart-
ment of Chemistry, University of Otago
8Chemistry in New Zealand January 2019
this project, Nigel and his team are
working on the rational synthesis
of conical carbon nanostructures as
a new class of molecular container
to be applied in supramolecularly-
assembled materials and host-guest
chemistry. Well done, Nigel!
More congratulations to Dave War-
ren who won the Premier Lecturer
in Summer School at the Otago Uni-
versity Students’ Association (OUSA)
Teaching Excellence Awards. Well
done, Dave, we know there are
many, many students who can attest
to your teaching skill and boundless
enthusiasm!
Congratulations to Calum Gordon
who jointly won the prize for the
best student talk at the Otago En-
ergy Research Centre (OERC) annual
symposium. Calum gave a great talk
on his undergraduate research proj-
ect in the group of Anna Garden on
optimising the rate of hydrogen evo-
lution reaction on MoS2 catalysts by
using graphene oxide supports and
is currently working in the group of
Carla Meledandri as a summer stu-
dent.
Welcome to Jonathan Falconer who
has joined the group of Carla Me-
ledandri as a postdoctoral research
fellow. Jonathan will be here for 12
months to research metal-organic
frameworks and study the antimicro-
bial properties of silver. Leon Escomel
and Andreas Durrmann are visiting
the group of Sally Brooker as intern-
ship students from Lyon, France and
Bayreuth, Germany, respectively.
Jaydee Cabral presented at
the World Congress on Advanced
Treatments & Technology in Wound
Care, 15-16 October, London with a
talk entitled, Biomaterials for regen-
erative cell therapy.
There was a big turnout by Otago
Prizewinners in the 2018 Otago-Southland High School Chemistry Quiz Night. Top to
Chemistry at the MacDiarmid In- bottom: 1st place Randal (King’s High School); 2nd place Avocadoes Number (Taieri Col-
stitute for Advanced Materials and lege); 3rd place Applied Physics (Otago Boys’ High School).
Nanotechnology’s annual sympo-
sium in late November. Anna Gar-
den, James Crowley and Jono Barn- This year’s Otago-Southland High initial round of Oxidants and reduc-
sley presented their research at the School Chemistry Quiz (the 16th) saw tants, things got down to business
symposium and many other staff and 33 teams from schools around Dune- with six rounds of questions of both
students participated in the excellent din and from further afield meet in a chemical nature as well as general
and constructive discussions around the Otago Museum’s Hutton The- knowledge, including a ‘name that
the future directions and science of atre to battle for the Bunsen Burner chemistry-related song’ audio-visual
the Institute. of Wisdom. After the usual feed of round for the first time. Teams also
pizza from Poppas Pizzas, and an contributed chemical haiku for extra
9Chemistry in New Zealand January 2019
prizes, with the winning haiku being: Quest competition, held at the Uni- NZIC President James Crowley vis-
versity. This was a fun-filled evening ited Waikato in November and gave
Neon turns me on for students studying NCEA level 2 a fascinating and very topical talk on
Like a filament lightbulb chemistry and a hard fought contest. Rise of the nano-machines: mechani-
That sh*t ain’t boron Prizes were shared right across the cally interlocked molecules and syn-
Greater Waikato and Bay of Plenty thetic molecular machines.
(The Colonials, King’s High School)
region and were awarded as follows:
It is with great sadness that we an-
Chemistry is hard
1st Place: Otumoetai College (John nounce the death of Associate Pro-
NA is an element Austin, Alice Cerdeira, Daniel Lee) fessor Alan Langdon, who passed
Also is my grade away after a long battle with illness
2nd Place: Tauranga Boys’ High
(Teresa’s Angels, James Hargest High on 1 September 2018. A full obituary
School (Benjamin Adams, Ryan Has-
School) for Alan is found elsewhere in this is-
tie, Ronan Yip)
sue of the journal.
If your teacher throws 3rd Place: Western Heights High
Sodium chloride at you School (Maddison Hagger, Nikiah Scion
Call cops, that’s a salt Pubben, Kesia Shoebridge)
Scion has welcomed three new
(Avocadoes Number, Taieri College) 4th Place: Hamilton Boys’ High chemists to its fold. Dr Miruna Petcu
School (Jeffrey Luo, Harsheel Singh, comes to us from Ligar (Hamilton),
The overall top-placed teams this Xinyuan Zhai) a start-up company manufacturing
year were: First: Randal (King’s High
5th Place: Hamilton Boys’ High molecularly imprinted polymers,
School); Second: Avocadoes Number
School (Liam Ballard, Sam Kim, Carl where she held the position of Chief
(Taieri College); Third: Applied Phys-
Stephens) Science Officer. Miruna will be work-
ics (Otago Boys’ High School).
ing on a range of projects from func-
Quizmaster Dave McMorran is The quiz was generously sponsored tional packaging to 3D printing. Dr
thanked for his excellent organisa- by the Waikato Branch of NZIC (ma- Helena Quilter has travelled about
tion of another successful and en- jor sponsor), Hill Laboratories and as far as you can and relocated from
tertaining quiz, along with generous the Faculty of Science and Engineer- the Centre for Sustainable Chemi-
sponsors Poppas Pizzas, the Otago ing, University of Waikato. Question cal Technologies at the University of
University Bookshop, the Otago master was Michèle Prinsep, ably as- Bath (UK) where she specialised in
branch of the NZIC and the Univer- sisted by numerous other staff and terpene derived polymers. Helena
sity of Otago. students from the Department. was using homogeneous catalysts to
promote ring-opening polymerisa-
The RSC Australasian Lecturer, Pro-
tion to form bio-based polyesters.
WAIKATO fesssor Mary Garson, visited Hamil-
Her background is a natural fit for
ton in September and gave a fasci-
Scion’s projects around bio-based
University of Waikato nating and very well attended lecture
performance materials. Dr Angelique
entitled, Game of terpenes: struc-
Nearly 150 students from the great- Greene from the US has joined us
tures, stereochemistry and chemical
er Waikato region and Bay of Plenty from Washington University in St.
ecology of nudibranch metabolites.
participated in the annual Chem- Louis where she researched smart
polymers, hydrogels and elastomers.
Angelique’s background will comple-
ment several Scion teams developing
functional and responsive polymers
and composites for new applications
such as 4D printing.
Dr Warren Grigsby and his Ligate™
team were presented with the Sci-
ence Impact Award at the Science
New Zealand Awards for their de-
velopment of a new 100% bio-based
resin. This chemical technology has
been scaled to multi-tonne quanti-
ties and is now being assessed for
uptake by a global company.
WELLINGTON
The 2018 Curtis Lecture was pre-
sented on 14 November by Professor
The winners of ChemQuest 2018 from Otumoetai College, Tauranga. From left to right:
John Austin, Alice Cerdeira, Daniel Lee.
Paul Bernhardt from the University of
10Chemistry in New Zealand January 2019
Queensland. His lecture started with
a description of Emeritus Professor
Neil Curtis’ contributions to chem-
istry, especially in his seminal dis-
covery and synthesis of macrocyclic
ligands, before linking neatly from
there into Professor Bernhardt’s own
research in electrochemical catalysis.
September’s meeting was Tailor Sk-
incare: blending science with busi-
ness by Sara Quilter from Tailor Sk-
incare. She spoke about the process
of combining business and science
in the context of starting Tailor Sk-
incare in her dad’s shed with a cake
mixer and leading to the full scale-up
of multiple different products. This
included a moisturiser production
demo and everyone got to take some
moisturiser home! Brian Halton with recent PhD graduate Amira Brackovic
NZIC Student Travel Grants were
awarded to Chriselle Braganza, Jor- VUW extra-cellular vesicles for diagnostic
dan McCone, Loc Tran, Joe Bracegir- and drug delivery applications, and
21 September 2018 marked 50 years
dle, Deanna Ayupova and Xu Tao this the interactions of metal nanopar-
to the day since Brian Halton arrived
year. Tao and Jordan attended the ticles with biomolecules. Nathaniel
at Victoria University of Wellington!
International Convention on Organic (Nate) Davis works on the synthesis
The School of Chemical and Physi-
Synthesis (ICOS-22) in Florence, Italy, of nanomaterials for optoelectronic
cal Sciences and the science com-
in September. Tao’s oral commu- applications such as photovoltaics,
munity in Wellington celebrated
nication was entitled, Towards the light emitting diodes and lumines-
this achievement with an afternoon
synthesis of pateamine A analogues; cence solar concentrators. Origi-
party. There were speeches, where
Jordan’s flash presentation and post- nally from Sydney, Australia, Nate
we heard about highlights of Brian’s
er were on A structure-based ap- obtained his PhD in physics from the
time at VUW, memories of past and
proach to kinase inhibition based on University of Cambridge, UK before
current staff and students, and even
the natural product (-)-TAN-2483B. taking up an Oppenheimer Early
a limerick composed for the event,
Loc attended an ACS Meeting in Bos- Career Research Fellowship, also at
as well as many photos, and a car-
ton during August, presenting on A Cambridge.
toon prepared by Brendan Burkett
new method for nitrate remediation
(ChemScrapes) to mark the occasion. Chemistry at Victoria University has
of water. Deanna took part in a com-
putational course on cancer biology hosted a number of excellent speak-
Congratulations to the following
in Paris in September. Joe attended ers recently. Mary Garson (Univer-
students who successfully defend-
a course on tropical seaweed biodi- sity of Queensland) gave the RSC
ed their PhD theses in the past few
versity and clean processing technol- Australasian Lecture on complex
months: Jonathan Tailby (supervi-
ogy. Chriselle travelled to Japan to terpenes from marine nudibranchs;
sors Ian Brown and John Spencer),
perform research in a collaborator’s Douglas MacFarlane (Monash Uni-
Amy Foster (supervisors Bridget
laboratory. versity) presented the Craig Medal
Stocker and Mattie Timmer), Amira
Lecture on materials for energy ex-
Brackovic (supervisors Joanne Har-
NZIC member Gary Evans (Ferrier port; Elizabeth Krenske (University
vey and Peter Tyler) and Parth Vash-
Institute, VUW) has recently become of Queensland) spoke on quantum
ishtha (supervisor Jonathan Halp-
the Chief Scientist at MBIE. Congrat- chemical calculations of synthetic
ert).
ulations also to Emily Parker (Ferrier chemical reactions; Nicola Brasch
Institute and SCPS, VUW) on elec- Two new nanomaterials chemists (Auckland University of Technology)
tion as a Fellow of the Royal Society have joined the physical chemistry presented on nitroxyl release mech-
Te Apārangi. Tim Kemmitt, who has team at the School of Chemical and anisms, with relevance to biochemis-
been at Callaghan Innovation (pre- Physical Sciences. Renee Goreham, try and drug delivery; Anna Garden
viously IRL) for 27 years, as well as previously a research fellow in Thom- (University of Otago) presented a
recently on the Wellington Branch as Nann’s team, has been on the seminar on modelling heteroge-
committee, has moved to Avertana NZIC Wellington Branch committee neous catalysis; while Mike Price and
Ltd - a mineral extraction company in this year, and has been the student Mat Anker, postdoctoral researchers
Auckland. liaison representative on the com- within the School, spoke about ultra-
mittee. Her research interests are in fast spectroscopy and indium N-het-
erocyclic carbenes respectively.
11Chemistry in New Zealand January 2019
Periodicity and approaches to periodic classification
Article
Brian Halton
School of Chemical & Physical Sciences, Victoria University of Wellington, PO Box 600, 6140
(email: brian.halton@vuw.ac.nz)
The United Nations have designated 2019 the International Year of the Periodic Table of Chemi-
cal Elements. It marks 150 years since Mendeleev’s first table.
Periodicity and the evolution of the periodic classification covery of phosphorus by Hennig Brand. He allowed 50
date back many centuries, but it is predominantly from buckets of urine to stand until they putrefied and bred
some fifteen chemists in the early to mid-nineteenth cen- worms. He then boiled the urine to a paste and heated it
tury that its development and Mendeleev’s classification with sand, thereby distilling elemental phosphorus from
became possible. The discovery of the periodic system the mixture. Brand reported his discovery in a letter to
arose from a number of scientific developments, and not Gottfried Leibniz, and, thereafter, demonstrations of the
a single discovery by Dmitri Ivanovich Mendeleev. That element and its ability to glow in the dark, or phospho-
all substances were made of fundamental building blocks resce, excited public interest. During the next 200 years,
stems from the ancient Greek and Hellenistic Egyptian a vast body of knowledge concerning the properties of
philosophers and their nature became an object of de- elements and their compounds was acquired. As the
bate through the centuries. It was Lucretius who pro- number of known elements grew, scientists began to
posed that they existed in 400 BC and they were named recognise patterns in properties, and began to develop
atoms (from the Greek atmos for indivisible). Early atom- classification schemes from what they knew. They tried
ic theory attempted to explain the properties of matter to organise the elements systematically into groups with
by assigning attributes to atoms that could match the at- similar properties. Although aspects of the early periodic
tributes of matter that they combined to form, such as table have been covered in publications of this Institute,1
colour, slipperiness, and liquidity. Philosophers catego- the designation of 2019 as the Year of the Periodic Table
rised what was around using property and function, and by the UN justifies a closer look at the time leading up to
it was from this type of approach that the periodic table its release in 1869.
of elements came.
Dmitri Mendeleev is the name every chemist takes as the
In the Middle Ages, alchemists sought to make gold and one who discovered the periodic table of the elements
silver from lead. While their efforts failed, the investiga- one hundred and fifty years ago. However, a significant
tions led (ultimately) to a systematic understanding of number of chemists had been investigating patterns in
the chemical world. They also established the where- the properties of the elements before him. The earli-
withal that gave us the periodic table of elements. In- est attempt at elemental classification was by Antoine
ternational trade, and especially that from the Silk Road Lavoisier in 1789 when he published a list of the then
between China and Europe, influenced the alchemists. known elements (and presuming that his prediction of
Chemical knowledge breached cultures and borders so silicon was included but only isolated by Berzelius in
that some 17 elements were known by about 1750 and 1823). He grouped them into gases, metals, nonmetals,
33 by the mid-19th century. Their recognition was a pre- and earths. Chemists then spent the following century
requisite to the construction of the periodic table. Ele- searching for a more precise classification scheme based
ments such as gold, silver, tin, copper, lead and mercury on their properties.
were recognised from antiquity, but the first scientific
discovery of an element occurred only in 1649, the dis- The early 19th century saw the Law of Definite Propor-
tions enunciated by Frenchman Joseph Proust in 1797
and demonstrated experimentally, and John Dalton prof-
fered the atomic theory to explain the laws of conserva-
tion and definite proportions. Then, in 1815 and 1816,2
Englishman William Prout anonymously published two
papers in which he noted that the atomic weights mea-
sured for the elements known at that time were whole
multiples of the atomic weight of hydrogen.3 This implied
the hydrogen atom to be the only truly fundamental par-
ticle, and he called it protyle. Moreover, he felt that the
atoms of the other elements were made of groupings of
various numbers of hydrogen atoms. Prout's hypothesis,
while not borne out later by more accurate measure-
ments of atomic weights, was sufficiently fundamental
to the insight of the structure of the atom that, in 1920,
Rutherford chose the name of the newly discovered pro-
Hennig Brandt: The Alchemist Discovering Phosphorus from Jo- ton to give credit to, among others, Prout. Prout also ar-
seph Wright, Derby, Oil on canvas 1771. gued that the term compound applied only to materials
12Chemistry in New Zealand January 2019
with fixed proportions. Apparently, he did not realise the about the same or differ by ca. 2, e.g. Cl, Br, I; Mn, Ni,
essential importance of his work lay in its verification of Co; Au, Ag; Na, K. Yet, despite all of this, no chemist was
Avogadro's hypothesis, namely equal volumes of gases, able to identify a relationship between all the known ele-
under identical physical conditions, contain equal num- ments. Later in his career from 1850, Max von Pettenkofer
bers of molecules. These works provided the fundamen- published and spoke about the numerical relations be-
tal evidence of matter existing as pure compounds rather tween the atomic masses of analogous elements almost
than mixtures of any proportion. It was from these ob- annually.7 His theories rejected triads and he expanded
servations, and the atomic theory of John Dalton begin- the connections between the elements to larger group-
ning in 1803, that the need for a systematic method of ings. He argued that the weights of different elements in
organising the elements was recognised. a group implied multiples of a certain number that var-
ied based upon the group. In his 1850 remarkable ad-
dress to the Royal Academy of Sciences, entitled: About
the regular intervals in the equivalent numbers of the so-
called simple radicals,8 Pettenkofer revealed his mastery
of chemical principles in what was a lead up to the pe-
riodic law of the elements. His intent in addressing the
Academy was to seek support to make the necessary pre-
cise determinations of various atomic weights in order to
verify the mathematical relationships between certain of
the elements. His classic report, published in an obscure
journal, was reprinted in Liebig’s Annalen der Chemie und
Pharmacie (1858)9 when his priority was threatened.
Left: Joseph Proust; right: William Prout from a miniature by
Henry Wyndham Phillips
Several more attempts appeared over the following cen-
tury.4-6 In 1817, Johann Döbereiner showed that the com-
bining weight (atomic weight) of strontium lies midway
between those of calcium and barium. Some years later,
he concluded that many of the elements fell into groups
of three based on their chemical properties. He termed
these triads and it became known as The Law of Triads.
Examples include chlorine, bromine and iodine, and lith-
ium, sodium and potassium. Moreover, he showed that
the atomic mass of the middle element was the average
of the first and third. However, little attention was paid to Left: Max von Pettenkofer; right: André Dumas
the triads as judged by the number of publications during
the 1829-1850 period. Leopold Gmelin worked with this In 1899 the German Chemical Society awarded him a
system and, by 1843, he had identified ten triads, three gold medal commemorating the fiftieth anniversary of
groups of four, and one group of five. Jean-Baptiste Du- the historic address. As early as 1828 the well-known
mas classified non-metals into groups as early as 1828 French chemist André Dumas had classified non-metals
and identified the triad sulfur, selenium and tellurium. into three groups. Then, in 1851, he gave a lecture to the
Published work in 1857 described the relationships be- British Association for the Advancement of Science10 On
tween various groups of metals. Atomic Volume and Atomic Weight and was aware of tri-
ads but not of Pettenkofer’s work. He felt that the middle
element of recognised triads could be a compound of the
two outer members, and that the component of the me-
tallic triads could perhaps merge into one another - alche-
my revisited. Another German chemist, Peter Kremers11
was also looking for relationships between elements, but
ones with little in common. He found that certain ele-
ments such as O, S, P, Se, and Ti differed in atomic weight
by 8, and found additional triads. He also found that
when the atomic weights of the metal is divided by 4 it
gave a whole number with an odd numbered remainder,
while those of the metalloids had an even number re-
mainder. From this, he concluded that the number 4 had
Left: Johann Döbereiner, right: Leopold Gmelin to be the atomic weight of a base element. Multiplying
this base elemental weight by an odd number gave that
It was H.F.M. Kopp, who established a standard for experi-
of a metalloid and, consequentially, that the attraction
mental work involving specific volumes in 1839 and also
of a metal for a non-metal was reduced to this relation-
sought a relationship between the elements. He found
ship – even and odd atomic weights. This was published
that the specific volumes of homologous elements are
in 1852.
13Chemistry in New Zealand January 2019
John Hall Gladstone followed with his 1853 publication: weights, Cooke was of the view that the series he created
On the relations between the atomic weights of analogous was an expression of divine law as opposed to chance.
elements in the Philosophical Magazine.12 Here, his inter- He used atomic weights to predict the properties of un-
est in triads was evident but, more importantly, in 1853 he known elements and was of the view that there was a
arranged the known elements in order of increasing atom- relationship with the laws of astronomy.
ic weight using the values given in Liebig's Jahresberichte
in 1851. He was the first chemist to do so. He saw nothing In 1857, Ernst Lenssen published articles14 saying that he
unusual in the numbers congregating around 28 and 52 had classified all the (known) elements except niobium
and with only one between 80 and 99; then followed a into triads by using half of the accepted atomic weights,
group of four. Gladstone had a mathematician show that quite unusual at that time. He took his thoughts further
the probability of such an unusual occurrence was 250:1, and put the triads into groups of threes, which he termed
and he went on to find the numerical relations to be of enneads. In his second paper that year, he noted that the
three kinds. The first had the atomic weights of analogous colours of most of the elements in each triad were com-
elements the same; the second in multiple proportions, plimentary and that this held for those of the flames from
and the third had them differ by certain regular incre- burning them in oxygen. Despite his factual observations,
ments. In the first class were Cr, Mn, Fe, Co, Ni with atomic he offered few theoretical explanations. Thus, by 1858,
weights approximating to 28 (O=8); Pd, Rh and Ru about the chemists of the era had expanded Döbereiner’s sug-
52, and Pt, Ir, and Os approximating to 99. In the second gestions and showed that similar relationships extended
class, Pt and Au were double the Pd group. His third class beyond the triads of elements; fluorine was added to
was of elements whose intermediate one has properties the halogens and magnesium to the alkaline-earth met-
between those of the other two, e.g. Li, Na, and K. als. Then oxygen, sulfur, selenium, and tellurium were
classed as one family of elements and nitrogen, phos-
phorus, arsenic, antimony, and bismuth as another. That
same year of 1857 saw Dumas focus on mathematical
equations that could account for the increase in atomic
weight within groups of chemically similar elements as
well as the organic chemistry homologous series. Also in
1857, William Odling of Guy’s Hospital in London carried
out a major review of all the periodicity data. He gained a
better feel for the properties of elements and concluded
that elements related to one another only when they
had many properties in common.15 He was convinced
that the elements in a compound needed comparison.
This conclusion came from the three series of acids, viz.
John Hall Gladstone HCl-HClO-HClO4, H2S-H2SO4, and H3P-H3PO4. Here, each
series represents five compounds of analogous combi-
These last four exponents show that by the 1850s the
nations of Cl, S, and P. He was cautious in defining his
attention of the European chemists on relationships be-
13 groups16 and did not initially include F with the other
tween the elements was rapidly increasing, and, by 1854,
halogens or O with S, Se, and Te because he found few
activity was evident from the USA with J.P. Cooke, the in-
relationships. He became the first chemist to see a rela-
augural professor of chemistry at Harvard (from 1850).
tionship between four groups as F gives HF, N provides
He arranged the elements into six groups with six series
NH3, O gives H2O, and C provides CH4; its origin came only
of homologous substances akin to organic chemistry.
after Kekulé’s revelation of the quadrivalence of carbon
His results related well to those of Pettenkofer13 but he
earlier in that same year of 1857.
felt that his results followed those of Gladstone and he
considered that elemental groups had to follow a math- In the following year, Dumas noted the numerical rela-
ematical series that gave atomic weight of 8 + n x 8 (or 4 tionships between the members of the fluorine and ni-
+ n x 8). Although he carried out a lot of work on atomic trogen groups, and the oxygen and magnesium groups
of five and four, respectively, e.g. F (19), N (14) and Ca
(20), S (16). After a revision of the atomic weights, Dumas
found that the fluorine and nitrogen groups had a regu-
lar mathematical progression, namely a, a+b. a +2b+b’,
a+2b+2b’+b’’, etc. This discovery was important because
it led to a relationship between all the elements. In ad-
dition, 1858 also saw textile chemist John Mercer17 re-
view the similarities between the F, O, N, and Mg groups,
and provide a simple mathematical relationship between
the atomic weights of the elements as shown in Parnell’s
book (p. 324 and 325).18 Mercer had a clear grasp of the
octet and the periods (based on O = 8)
Left: Josiah Parsons Cooke; right William Odling (courtesy of
By 1860, Avagadro had re-determined atomic weights
John Odling-Smee) of many of the elements, and M.C. Lea in the USA did
14You can also read
