Heinrich Rubens, Marianus Czerny, Clemens Schaefer, Frank Matossi and what they stand for? Why do you think that in articles like Article Technological Innovation in Science: The Adoption of Infrare...
a large part is dedicated to William Coblentz, but those four are not even mentioned?
Maybe I have to give a first answer to fuel a discussion. If you look into modern infrared spectroscopy books, these books usually just show spectra of organic and biological matter. Depending on what angle you look at it, you can say that the above four were the pioneers of far infrared spectroscopy, or/and infrared spectroscopy of inorganic matter. Also, in contrast to William Coblentz, who thought that "Experimental observations always have some value. This is not always true of theories which are built, more or less, upon hypotheses and must stand or fall with them."', they interpreted their experimental results based on optical and dispersion theory.
Dear Thomas,
as old spectroscopist (IR and UV-Vis and Fluorescence) , I donate a gallon fuel to fuel the discussion (Thomas dixit).
I know the " work" the above cited IR scientists and other scientists not cited for this discussion like R. Mecke , E. Funck and E.W. Schmid.
All deceased.
I bought a little part of the estate of F. Matossi, R. Mecke, E. Funck and E.W. Schmid several decades ago.
The article cited above (Technological Innovation in Science/ The adoption of Infrared Spectroscopy by Chemists) shows that the author has not compilated and read all the papers about IR (earlier Ultrarot e.g. ultrarot spectroscopy or ultra red spectroscopy) in different languages.
Next time another comment!
JRG
Dear Jean,
many thanks! Indeed, the language barrier is a problem (and that Web of Science just goes back to 1945... ;-).
On the other hand, Marianus Czerny had a number of guests from the US and common paper with them, also in English. They also used what they learnt there, which is obvious from these reviews:
Article A survey of infra-red spectroscopy. I. The early history and...
Article A survey of infra-red spectroscopy. Part II. The origin, app...
Nevertheless, nothing of this transpired into the theories of "modern" IR spectroscopy, which is in some very important aspects stuck in the 1850ies between Beer's law and the advent of Maxwell's equations...
I know the 2 articles too and I join a ref. of R.B. Barnes et al (cited in Werner Brügel (Einführung in der Ultrarot Spektroskopie/Verlag D. Steinkopff Darmstadt 1954).
This book is very useful as overview about IR spectrocopy.
Joined are the pdf files of the above cited articles (my own library). Why?
An article request (see R.G. ) from authors is obsolete because the authors are the most time deceased.
RG ´s scientists can read these 2 articles and participate in this interesting discussion about IR spectroscopy ( I wish it!!).
Another comment in due course.
JRG
The Brügel is a great book! I bought the 2nd edition just a couple of months ago. I also bought at about the same time a copy of the book "Das ultrarote Spektrum" which appeared in 1930.
It is unbelievable and a real eye-opener what these guys knew already back then... which is no wonder as, e.g., Rubens was the successor of Paul Drude and Czerny played chamber music together with Max Planck and Albert Einstein (and I can't imagine that they made just music and did not "talk shop"...;-)
Concerning the fruitful scientific exchange in France (G.Urbain) and Germany (Prussia) and USA, I join 4 pictures (unfortunately in German). See the 2 pages of the preface (G.Urbain).
The cited references are worthwhile to be read (French, English, German)
Next time I send Infos about the first automatic IR spectrometer (USA/Germany/Prussia) and IR,Near IR and FT-IR.
JRG
Terrific! I just obtained a PDF of Woldemar Voigt's book (you can get it for free under https://archive.org/details/magnetoundelekt00voiggoog/page/n5 ).
Voigt was the supervisor of Paul Drude, whose successor in Berlin was Heinrich Rubens. Voigt and Drude were deep into dispersion theorie which fully explains the band shape of most bands in IR reflectance and transmittance spectra (also those of absorbance, when properly corrected), in particular since slit-functions do no longer play an important role since the advent of FT-IR. In this regard, the band profile named after Voigt is obsolete, in contrast to his insights in dispersion.
Dear Thomas,
Thank you very much for reply, comment and infos about Voigt.
I hope that more RG members will take part to our interesting discussion.
JRG
Dear Jean,
unfortunately I do not have access to the book of Georges Urbain. It would be very interesting to learn what he taught his students at that time about Beer's law and absorption in general. Do you think you could provide a couple of sentences to summarize the corresponding content? I would highly appreciate that!
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