Sir Benjamin Collins Brodie, Bt | |
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 Portrait, initialled and dated: "E.A. 1874" | |
| Born | (1817-03-15)15 March 1817 |
| Died | 24 November 1880(1880-11-24) (aged 63) St Clare,Isle of Wight,England |
| Alma mater | Balliol College, Oxford University of Giessen |
| Known for | Analysis ofbeeswax, work onperoxides |
| Awards | Royal Medal (1850) |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Physical chemistry |
| Institutions | University of Oxford |
| Academic advisors | Justus von Liebig[1] |
| Doctoral students | Augustus George Vernon Harcourt[1] |
Sir Benjamin Collins Brodie, 2nd BaronetFRS (5 February 1817 – 24 November 1880) was an Englishchemist.
Brodie was the son ofSir Benjamin Collins Brodie, 1st Baronet, and his wife Anne (Née Sellon), and was educated atHarrow School andBalliol College, Oxford. He obtained a second-class honours degree inmathematics in 1838. Because he was anagnostic and would not assent to theThirty-nine articles, he was refused aMA until 1860.[2] He studied chemistry withJustus von Liebig inGiessen along withAlexander Williamson. At Giessen, he did an original analysis ofbeeswax for which he was given theFellowship of the Royal Society in 1849 and awarded theRoyal Medal in 1850.
Brodie did important original work onperoxides in his private laboratory[3] where he taughtNevil Story Maskelyne chemistry. He was secretary of theChemical Society from 1850 to 1854 and its president in 1860. However, he opposed theatomic theory and proposed in 1866 his Calculus of Chemical Operations[4] as a non-atomic alternative to the atomic theory. He saw an advertisement for wooden balls and wire for building models of molecules. This provoked him into describing atomic theory as a "thoroughly materialistic bit of joiner's work".[5]
Despite opposition from some theological fellows, he was elected to the Aldrichan Chair (later renamed as theWaynflete Professor of Chemistry) atOxford University 1865 to 1872, and is chiefly known for his investigations on the allotropic states of carbon and his discovery of graphitic acid.[6]
Brodie married Philothea Margaret, daughter of John Vincent Thompson, in 1848. They had one son and five daughters. He died in November 1880, aged 63, and was succeeded in the baronet by his only son Benjamin. Lady Brodie died in 1882.
One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Brodie, Sir Benjamin Collins".Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 4 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 625.| Baronetage of the United Kingdom | ||
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| Preceded by | Baronet (of Boxford) 1862–1880 | Succeeded by Benjamin Vincent Sellon Brodie |
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