Staudinger was born in 1881 inWorms. Staudinger, who initially wanted to become a botanist, studied chemistry at theUniversity of Halle, at theTH Darmstadt and at theLMU Munich. He received his "Verbandsexamen" (comparable to Master's degree) fromTH Darmstadt. After receiving his Ph.D. from theUniversity of Halle in 1903, Staudinger qualified as an academic lecturer at theUniversity of Strasbourg in 1907.[1] He was supported in his work by his new wifeDora Staudinger who wrote up his lectures.[2]
Figure 1. The general structure of a ketene. R is any group.
It was here that he discovered theketenes, a family of molecules characterized by the general form depicted inFigure 1.[3] Ketenes would prove a synthetically important intermediate for the production of yet-to-be-discovered antibiotics such aspenicillin andamoxicillin.[4]
In 1907, Staudinger began an assistant professorship at theTechnical University of Karlsruhe. Here, he successfully isolated a number of useful organic compounds (including a synthetic coffee flavoring) as more completely reviewed by Rolf Mülhaupt.[5] Here too he guided future Nobel laureatesLeopold Ružička (1910) andTadeusz Reichstein to their doctorates.[6]
While in autumn 1914 German professors joined the widespread public support of the war, Staudinger refused to signManifesto of the Ninety-Three and joined the few exceptions likeMax Born,Otto Buek andAlbert Einstein in condemning it. In 1917 he authored an essay predicting the defeat of Germany due to industrial superiority oftheEntente and called for a peaceful settlement as soon as possible, and after theentrance of the US he repeated the call in a long letter to the German military leadership.[9]Fritz Haber attacked him for his essay, accusing him of harming Germany, and Staudinger in turn criticized Haber for his role in the German chemical weapons program.
While at Karlsruhe and later, Zurich, Staudinger began research in the chemistry ofrubber, for which very highmolecular weights had been measured by the physical methods ofRaoult andvan 't Hoff. Contrary to prevailing ideas (see below), Staudinger proposed in a landmark paper published in 1920 thatrubber and otherpolymers such asstarch,cellulose andproteins are long chains of short repeating molecular units linked bycovalent bonds.[10] In other words, polymers are like chains of paper clips, made up of small constituent parts linked from end to end (Figure 3).
Figure 3. A chain of paper clips(above) is a good model for a polymer such aspolylactic acid(below). The polymer chain is composed of small pieces linked together in a head-to-tail fashion.
At the time, leading organic chemists such asEmil Fischer andHeinrich Wieland[5][11] believed that the measured high molecular weights were only apparent values caused by the aggregation of small molecules intocolloids. At first, the majority of Staudinger’s colleagues refused to accept the possibility that small molecules could link together covalently to form high-molecular weight compounds. As Mülhaupt aptly notes, this is due in part to the fact that molecular structure and bonding theory were not fully understood in the early 20th century.[5]
In 1926, he was appointed lecturer of chemistry at theUniversity of Freiburg at Freiburg im Breisgau (Germany), where he spent the rest of his career.[12] Further evidence to support his polymer hypothesis emerged in the 1930s. High molecular weights of polymers were confirmed bymembrane osmometry, and also by Staudinger’s measurements ofviscosity in solution. TheX-ray diffraction studies of polymers byHerman Mark provided direct evidence for long chains of repeating molecular units. And the synthetic work led byCarothers demonstrated that polymers such asnylon andpolyester could be prepared by well-understood organic reactions. His theory opened up the subject to further development, and helped place polymer science on a sound basis.
He married in 1906 to Dora Förster and they remained together until their divorce in 1926. They had four children including Eva Lezzi (1907-1993) and Klar (Klara) Kaufmann who were active in resisting the rise of fascism. Dora married again and became a leading peace activist.[2]
In 1927, he married the Latvian botanist,Magda Voita (also shown as;German:Magda Woit), who was a collaborator with him until his death and whose contributions he acknowledged in his Nobel Prize acceptance.[13]
Staudinger's groundbreaking elucidation of the nature of the high-molecular weight compounds he termedMakromoleküle paved the way for the birth of the field of polymer chemistry.[17] Staudinger himself saw the potential for this science long before it was fully realized. "It is not improbable," Staudinger commented in 1936, "that sooner or later a way will be discovered to prepare artificial fibers from synthetic high-molecular products, because the strength and elasticity of natural fibers depend exclusively on their macro-molecular structure – i.e., on their long thread-shaped molecules."[18] Staudinger founded the first polymer chemistry journal in 1940,[19] and in 1953 received theNobel Prize in Chemistry for "his discoveries in the field of macromolecular chemistry."[20] In 1999, theAmerican Chemical Society and theGerman Chemical Society designated Staudinger's work as anInternational Historic Chemical Landmark.[21] His pioneering research has afforded the world myriad plastics, textiles, and other polymeric materials which make consumer products more affordable, attractive and enjoyable, while helping engineers develop lighter and more durable structures. TheGerman Chemical Society started theHermann Staudinger Prize in 1971 to recognize fundamental contributions inpolymer science.
^Bernd Martin:Die Entlassung der jüdischen Lehrkräfte an der Freiburger Universität und die Bemühungen um ihre Wiedereingliederung nach 1945. In: Freiburger Universitätsblätter. H. 129, September 1995, pp. 7–46.
^Guido Deußing, Markus Weber, Das Leben des Hermann Staudinger, k-online, 2012, Teil 3.
^Uta Deichmann,Flüchten, Mitmachen, Vergessen. Chemiker und Biochemiker in der NS-Zeit. Weinheim: Wiley-VCH 2001.
^Staudinger, H. (1933). "Viscosity investigations for the examination of the constitution of natural products of high molecular weight and of rubber and cellulose".Trans. Faraday Soc.29 (140):18–32.doi:10.1039/tf9332900018.
Helmut Ringsdorf (2004). "Hermann Staudinger and the Future of Polymer Research Jubilees – Beloved Occasions for Cultural Piety".Angewandte Chemie International Edition.43 (9):1064–1076.doi:10.1002/anie.200330071.PMID14983439.
