Marie francois raoult biography

François-Marie Raoult was a French chemist who conducted research into the behavior of solutions, especially their physical properties.
François-Marie Raoult was a French chemist who conducted research into the behavior of solutions, especially their physical properties.
François-Marie Raoult was a French chemist who formulated a law on solutions (called Raoult's law) that made it possible to determine the molecular weights.

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Francois-Marie Raoult

(1830–1901) French chemist

Raoult came from a poor background in Fournes-en-Weppes, France. He obtained his PhD in 1863 from the University of Paris and was 37 years old when he took up his first academic appointment at the University of Grenoble, where he was made professor of chemistry in 1870.

Raoult is noted for his work on the properties of solutions, in particular the effect of a dissolved substance in the lowering of freezing points. In 1882 he showed (Raoult's law) that the depression in the freezing point of a given solvent was proportional to the mass of substance dissolved divided by the substance's molecular weight. He later showed a similar effect for the vapor pressure of solutions. Measurement of freezing-point depression became an important technique for determining molecular weights.

Raoult's work was also important in validating Jacobus van't Hoff's theory of solutions. Also of significance in his work was his observation that the depression of the freezing point of water caused by an inorganic salt was double that caused by an organic

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Raoult, François Marie

(b. Fournes, France, 10 May 1830; d. Grenoble, France, 1 April 1901)

chemistry.

Raoult early chose a scientific career. Despite family encouragement, he lacked the financial resources to complete his work at the University of Paris, although he presented a brief note on electrolytic transport and on electrical endosmosis to the Académie des Sciences. This note, which appeared in Comptes rendus … de l’Académie des sciences in 1853, was the first of more than 100 published papers.

In 1853 Raoult was employed as a teacher at the lycée in Reims, then moved to the College of St. Dié as régent de physique. At St. Dié he received the baccalauréat ès lettres and baccalauréat ès sciences, passed the licencié examination, and was appointed an agrégé de l’enseignement secondaire spécial. In 1862 he moved to the lycée at Sens, where, on his own, he carried out research on the electromotive force of voltaic cells; this research led in 1863 to the docteurès sciences physiques from the University of Paris.

In 1867 Raoult was called to the Facu

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1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Raoult, François Marie

RAOULT, FRANÇOIS MARIE (1830–1901), French chemist, was born at Fournes, in the Département du Nord, on the 10th of May 1830. He became aspirant répétiteur at the lycée of Rheims in 1853, and after holding several intermediate positions was appointed in 1862 to the professorship of chemistry in Sens lycée, where he prepared the thesis on electromotive force which gained him his doctor's degree at Paris in the following year. In 1867 he was put in charge of the chemistry classes at Grenoble, and three years later he succeeded to the chair of chemistry, which he held until his death on the 1st of April 1901. Raoult's earliest researches were physical in character, being largely concerned with the phenomena of the voltaic cell, and later there was a. period when more purely chemical questions engaged his attention. But his name is best known in connexion with the work on solutions, to which he devoted the last two decades of his life. His first paper on the depression of the freezing-points of liquids by the presence o