Biron, Evgenii Vladislavovich

Biron, Evgenii Vladislavovich 

Born Sept. 6 (18), 1874, in Kalisz, Poland; died Aug. 3, 1919, in Tomsk. Russian physical chemist; student of D. P. Konovalov. Professor at the Forestry Institute in St. Petersburg (from 1910) and at the Tomsk Technological Institute (from 1917).

Biron’s primary works were devoted to the development of D. I. Mendeleev’s chemical theory of solutions. By studying the system H₂SO₄—H₂O using cryoscopic methods, Biron demonstrated the existence of the hydrate H₂SO₄ • 2H₂O in 1899, which was predicted by Mendeleev. Investigating the density of mixtures of two normal (nonas-sociated) liquids, Biron derived a number of rules. In particular, he found that the contraction D depended on the molecular concentration x as expressed by the formula D = Kx(1- x), where K is the contraction constant, which depends on the temperature (1912). He discovered the rule of secondary periodicity in 1915. From 1915 to 1917 he directed research on toxic substances for military uses.

REFERENCES

Menshutkin, B. N. “Evgenii Vladislavovich Biron.” Zhurnal Russkogo fiziko-khimicheskogo ob-va: Chast’ khimicheskaia, 1930, vol. 62, issue 7.
Makarenia, A. A., and V. I. Timofeev. “Raboty E. V. Birona po fizicheskoi khimii.” Trudy In-ta istorii estestvoznaniia i tekhniki, 1961, vol. 35, pp. 108–25.

S. A. POGODIN