Arrhenius, Svante

Arrhenius, Svante (August)

Svante Arrhenius, 1918.

(credit: Courtesy of the Kungliga Biblioteket, Stockholm)

(born Feb. 19, 1859, Vik, Swed.—died Oct. 2, 1927, Stockholm) Swedish physical chemist. His theories on dissociation of substances in solution into electrolytes or ions, first published in 1884 as his Ph.D. thesis, were initially met with skepticism, but increasing recognition abroad gradually won over the opposition in Sweden. He also did important work on reaction rates; the equation describing the dependence of reaction rates on temperature is often called the Arrhenius law, and he was the first to recognize the greenhouse effect. After receiving the Royal Society of London's Davy Medal (1902), he became in 1903 the third recipient of the Nobel Prize for Chemistry. He is regarded as one of the founders of the field of physical chemistry.