Edmund DavyDied 5 Nov 1857 (born 1785). English chemist who discovered acetylene gas. He gained experience while assisting his cousin, Humphry Davy in his chemical researches at the Royal Institution. From 1813, he pursued a career as a professor of chemistry in Ireland. Edmund Davy was the first to discover a finely divided, spongy platinum with remarkable gas-absorptive and catalytic properties. In 1836, by heating potassium carbonate with carbon at very high temperatures, he produced a residue of what is now known as potassium carbide, (K2C2), which reacted with water to release a new gas he recognised as a “new carburet of hydrogen.” In 1860, during a thorough investigation of hydrocarbons, Marcellin Berthelot rediscovered the gas and coined its name “acetylene”« |
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