Christian Wilhelm Blomstrand

Christian Wilhelm Blomstrand (20 October 1826 – 5 November 1897) was a Swedish mineralogist and chemist. He was a professor at the University of Lund from 1862 to 1895, where he isolated the element niobium in 1864. He developed an early version of the periodic table and made advances in understanding the chemistry of coordination compounds. Blomstrand published textbooks in chemistry and was well known internationally for his scientific contributions.

Blomstrand studied mineralogy at the University of Lund, where he earned a philosophy degree in 1850. He then became interested in chemistry and was the first recipient of the Berzelius scholarship. In 1854, he completed his habilitation for research on bromine and iodine compounds of tin. Blomstrand's entire career was at the University of Lund.

Blomstrand was appointed an adjunct lecturer and laboratory demonstrator in chemistry at the University of Lund in 1856.

The elements

Blomstrand's experimental research involved the characterization and analysis of minerals, particularly those which were rare or of unknown composition. These included euxenite, ilmenite, monazite, niobite, and tantalite. He focused on the chemical analysis of what are now known as the group Vb subgroup of Group 5 elements. These "earth acids" include the elements tantalum, niobium, molybdenum, tungsten, and their various mineral associates. Blomstrand had been studying various metal chlorides, and he identified the oxychloride of niobium, NbOCl3 as part of this investigation. Niobium had previously been discovered in 1801 by English scientist Charles Hatchett, using an ore obtained from the United States. Hackett named the element Columbium, only being renamed Niobium in 1950. However, the element was not obtained in pure form until Blomstrand conducted his investigations.

In 1870, Blomstrand proposed a new way of systematizing the elements, a "natural system" based on atomicity (the ability of elements to combine with other elements) and the electrochemical properties of the element. Organizing the elements into subgroups of even and odd atomicity revealed "extraordinary regularities". While Blomsrand's system was a significant advance toward developing a periodic table of the elements, it did not account well for metals. Blomstrand included his system in his revised edition of Nils Johan Berlins popular textbook in 1870, and in his own textbooks in 1873 and 1875. Dmitri Mendeleev, later credited with developing the periodic table in widespread use, credited Blomstrand with important early advances leading to the organization of the periodic system.

Chemical structure One of Blomstrand's goals was to develop an understanding of how atoms are bonded together to form compounds and the resulting chemical structures of compounds. He attempted to reconcile the dualistic theory of Jöns Jacob Berzelius with unitary and type theories.

Blomstrand developed the most widely accepted of the 19th century theories of coordination complexes. His chain theory (1869) was further developed, modified, and experimentally supported by his colleague Sophus Mads Jørgensen.

Representative publications