Alfred Bertheim (17 April 1879 – 17 August 1914) was a German

chemist A chemist (from Greek ''chēm(ía)'' alchemy; replacing ''chymist'' from Medieval Latin ''alchemist'') is a graduated scientist trained in the study of chemistry, or an officially enrolled student in the field. Chemists study the composition of ...

, best known for his research on

arsenic Arsenic is a chemical element; it has Symbol (chemistry), symbol As and atomic number 33. It is a metalloid and one of the pnictogens, and therefore shares many properties with its group 15 neighbors phosphorus and antimony. Arsenic is not ...

compounds with

Paul Ehrlich Paul Ehrlich (; 14 March 1854 – 20 August 1915) was a Nobel Prize-winning German physician and scientist who worked in the fields of hematology, immunology and antimicrobial chemotherapy. Among his foremost achievements were finding a cure fo ...

. Bertheim was born in 1879 in

Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...

and studied chemistry in Strasbourg and Berlin, where he gained his doctorate in 1901, with a thesis "Ueber die fluorescierende Verbindung aus Chlor-alpha-naphtochinonacetessigeste". He served as an assistant to Privy Councilor Liebermann and Professor Rosenheim in Berlin. In 1904 and 1905, he worked as a manufacturing chemist in

Bitterfeld Bitterfeld () is a town in the district of Anhalt-Bitterfeld, Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. Since 1 July 2007 it has been part of the town of Bitterfeld-Wolfen. It is situated approximately 25 km south of Dessau, and 30 km northeast of Hall ...

before moving to the Georg-Speyer-Haus in 1906. There, together with

, he elucidated the chemical constitution of atoxyl and synthesized innumerable arsenobenzene compounds. He was also responsible for the synthesis of

Salvarsan Arsphenamine, also known as Salvarsan or compound 606, is an antibiotic drug that was introduced at the beginning of the 1910s as the first effective treatment for the deadly infectious diseases syphilis, relapsing fever, and African trypanosomias ...

and published "Ein Handbuch der organischen Arsenverbindungen" (A handbook of organic arsenic compounds).WorldCat item record
/ref> Bertheim enlisted as a war volunteer and died in an accident in Berlin on 17 August 1914.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bertheim, Alfred 1879 births 1914 deaths 20th-century German chemists Scientists from Berlin German military personnel killed in World War I Accidental deaths in Germany