David Leonard Chapman FRS (6 December 1869 – 17 January 1958) was an English physical chemist, whose name is associated with the Chapman-Jouguet treatment (on the theory of detonation in gases) and the Gouy-Chapman layer (the surface layer of ions distributed on a charged surface). He was a

fellow A fellow is a title and form of address for distinguished, learned, or skilled individuals in academia, medicine, research, and industry. The exact meaning of the term differs in each field. In learned society, learned or professional society, p ...

Jesus College, Oxford Jesus College (in full: Jesus College in the University of Oxford of Queen Elizabeth's Foundation) is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. It is in the centre of the city, on a site between Turl Street, Ship ...

for 37 years, and was in charge there of the last college laboratory at the

University of Oxford The University of Oxford is a collegiate university, collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the List of oldest un ...

Education and early life

Chapman was born in Wells, Norfolk but moved with his family to

Manchester Manchester () is a city and the metropolitan borough of Greater Manchester, England. It had an estimated population of in . Greater Manchester is the third-most populous metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, with a population of 2.92&nbs ...

and attended

Manchester Grammar School The Manchester Grammar School (MGS) is a highly Selective school, selective Private_schools_in_the_United_Kingdom, private day school for boys aged 7-18 in Manchester, England, which was founded in 1515 by Hugh Oldham (then Bishop of Exeter). ...

. He then went to

Christ Church, Oxford Christ Church (, the temple or house, ''wikt:aedes, ædes'', of Christ, and thus sometimes known as "The House") is a Colleges of the University of Oxford, constituent college of the University of Oxford in England. Founded in 1546 by Henry V ...

, obtaining degrees in

chemistry Chemistry is the scientific study of the properties and behavior of matter. It is a physical science within the natural sciences that studies the chemical elements that make up matter and chemical compound, compounds made of atoms, molecules a ...

(1893, 1st class) and

physics Physics is the scientific study of matter, its Elementary particle, fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge whi ...

(1894, 2nd class).

Personal life

Campman was by reputation something of a scientific recluse, difficult to dislodge from his laboratory, although he did play a full part in University and College affairs. Away from his teaching and research, he was reserved and somewhat eccentric, but enjoyed golf, cycling and walking. He married one of his research students, Muriel Holmes (a member of the university's Society of Oxford Home-Students) in 1918 and together they had a daughter, Ruth. He died from cancer at his home in Oxford in 1958.

Career

Chapman was a science master at Giggleswick School for a time before becoming a member of staff at the

University of Manchester The University of Manchester is a public university, public research university in Manchester, England. The main campus is south of Manchester city centre, Manchester City Centre on Wilmslow Road, Oxford Road. The University of Manchester is c ...

. In 1907,

appointed him as fellow and tutor in charge of its new teaching and research laboratory. Chapman ran this until his retirement in 1944; the laboratory, the last college-run laboratory in the university, closed in 1947. Chapman was also vice-principal of the college (1926–44).

Research

Although Chapman took a keen interest in his students, research was his main priority. Chapman had a particular interest in the photochemical reaction of

hydrogen Hydrogen is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol H and atomic number 1. It is the lightest and abundance of the chemical elements, most abundant chemical element in the universe, constituting about 75% of all baryon, normal matter ...

and

chlorine Chlorine is a chemical element; it has Symbol (chemistry), symbol Cl and atomic number 17. The second-lightest of the halogens, it appears between fluorine and bromine in the periodic table and its properties are mostly intermediate between ...

, establishing that minute traces of impurities caused unexpected consequences. He suggested the

steady state In systems theory, a system or a process is in a steady state if the variables (called state variables) which define the behavior of the system or the process are unchanging in time. In continuous time, this means that for those properties ''p' ...

hypothesis in 1913. He discovered that the interruption of light by a rotating sector caused the rate of the reaction to vary with the frequency of the sector and, in 1926, he was the first to apply this theory to measure the 'mean life' of a reaction intermediate. Other areas of interest were the theory of detonation in gases (the subject of an important paper that Chapman published in 1899, with reliable calculations of detonation speeds; the theory is still known as the Chapman-Jouget treatment) and the distribution of ions at a charged surface (with the name of the Gouy-Chapman layer being given to the surface layer that he envisaged).

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Chapman, David Leonard 1869 births 1958 deaths People from Wells-next-the-Sea People educated at Manchester Grammar School Alumni of Christ Church, Oxford English physical chemists Academics of the Victoria University of Manchester Fellows of Jesus College, Oxford Fellows of the Royal Society Deaths from cancer in England

Education and early life

Personal life

Career

Research

See also

References