The LCGC Blog: Historical (Analytical) Chemistry Landmarks

When I was a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Michigan, I walked past a plaque from the American Chemical Society (ACS) commemorating “the discovery of organic free radicals” (1) every morning. This plaque is part of the Society’s National Historic Chemical Landmarks program, which is designed “to enhance public appreciation for the contributions of the chemical sciences to modern life in the United States and to encourage a sense of pride in their practitioners for chemistry’s rich history” (2). I don’t think that I truly appreciated the significance of places, people, and events in chemical history that have achieved “Landmark” status until this past summer, when my family and I had a chance to visit the Priestley House in Northumberland, Pennsylvania (3). This Pennsylvania Historical & Museum Commission historic home is a Landmark that is not only important to the development of chemistry research in the United States, but it is also where the initial discussions to establish the ACS itself were held in 1874 (4). I highly recommend that any chemist that has the opportunity to visit this site does so, as it was a great place to learn more about an important part of our field’s development.

Photo credit: James Grinias

Since the visit, I have thought a lot about relevant sites within the field of separation science that could meet the criteria of the ACS Landmarks program. In the current listing as of 2024 (5), the following Landmarks are the ones (in my opinion) most closely related to chemical analysis, measurement science, and analytical instrumentation (listed in chronological order based on Landmark designation year):

1. Edward W. Morley and the Atomic Weight of Oxygen (Case Western Reserve University)
2. C.V. Raman and the Raman Effect (Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science)
3. The National Institute of Standards and Technology (Gaithersburg, Maryland)
4. Noyes Laboratory at the University of Illinois (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign)
5. Development of the Beckman pH Meter (California Institute of Technology)
6. Al and Helen Free and the Development of Diagnostic Test Strips (ETHOS Science Center)
7. NMR and MRI: Applications in Chemistry and Medicine (Stony Brook University and Agilent Technologies Santa Clara campus)
8. Flavor Chemistry Research at the USDA Western Regional Research Center (Albany, California)
9. Izaak Maurits Kolthoff and Modern Analytical Chemistry (University of Minnesota, Twin Cities)
10. Isolation of Phytochrome (USDA Beltsville Agricultural Research Center)
11. Willard Libby and Radiocarbon Dating (University of Chicago)
12. Infrared Spectrometer and the Exploration of Mars (University of California, Berkeley)
13. Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry (Midland, Michigan)
14. Saul Hertz and the Medical Uses of Radioiodine (Massachusetts General Hospital)
15. Oesper Collections in the History of Chemistry (University of Cincinnati)
16. Science History Institute (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania)

Of these Landmarks, only two have a heavy emphasis on analytical separations: the establishment of GC-MS as a hyphenated measurement technique at Dow (6) and its later use as a strategy to aid in flavor and fragrance analysis at the USDA (7). What other places are important to the field of chromatography that we could highlight as a community? With my specific interests in (and perhaps bias towards) liquid-phase separations, a few sites come to mind:

The Birth of HPLC (Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, Connecticut)

As thoroughly detailed by Leslie Ettre in a 2005 issue of LCGC (8), the early work by Csaba Horváth that led to the modern HPLC instrument (9) was conducted at Yale’s School of Medicine. Although he later was affiliated with engineering programs at the school, including a tenure as the chair of the Department of Chemical Engineering, Horváth’s “Landmark” achievement is tied to the medical school and could be recognized there.

Commercializing Chromatography in the Framingham Police Station Basement (Framingham, Massachusetts)

Also detailed by Ettre in LCGC in 2005 (10), the legend of Jim Waters forming Waters Associates in the rented basement of the Framingham Police Station is well-known to HPLC historians. Starting with gel permeation chromatographs, the company eventually released a commercial HPLC instrument in 1967 (11). This location provides not only an important story about separation science, but also a tale about entrepreneurship in the analytical instrumentation market that emerged in the mid-20th century.

And because methods using chromatographic separations are often enhanced when coupled to mass spectrometry, an additional option could include:

The Triple-Quadrupole Mass Spectrometer (Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan and La Trobe University, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia)

The journey to establishing the triple quadrupole MS instrument in the late 1970s by Richard Yost, Chris Enke, and Jim Morrison faced a number of challenges, including a number of negative grant reviewers that didn’t believe the idea would work (12). However, the global collaboration eventually demonstrated the strength of the technique, especially for compound identification (13). Today, LC-MS/MS utilizing QqQ-MS is a key technique within the areas of clinical diagnostics, environmental monitoring, forensic analysis, and a broad array of other application areas, making it worthy of recognition as a Landmark technology.

These are, of course, just a few of the many places and ideas that could be recognized as part of this ACS program. Additionally, we as analytical chemists already have our own physical display of recognized people and ideas that one can visit each year at Pittcon: the Pittcon Hall of Fame (14). A walk through this exhibit each year can help us remember the pioneers who helped develop the modern field of instrumental analysis… and perhaps inspire a spark for the next National Historic Chemical Landmark!

References

(1) Moses Gomberg and the Discovery of Organic Free Radicals. American Chemical Society National Historic Chemical Landmarks 2024. https://www.acs.org/content/acs/en/education/whatischemistry/landmarks/freeradicals.html (accessed 2024-9-30)

(2) About the National Historic Chemical Landmarks Program. American Chemical Society 2024. https://www.acs.org/education/whatischemistry/landmarks/about.html (accessed 2024-9-30)

(3) Discover the Joseph Priestley House: A Warm Welcome to History and Heritage. Friends of Joseph Priestley House 2024. https://joseph-priestley-house.org/ (accessed 2024-9-30)

(4) Joseph Priestley and the Discovery of Oxygen. American Chemical Society International Historic Chemical Landmarks 2024. https://www.acs.org/content/acs/en/education/whatischemistry/landmarks/josephpriestleyoxygen.html (accessed 2024-9-30)

(5) Directory of National Historic Chemical Landmarks. American Chemical Society 2024. https://www.acs.org/education/whatischemistry/landmarks/landmarksdirectory.html (accessed 2024-9-30)

(6) Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry. American Chemical Society National Historic Chemical Landmarks 2024. https://www.acs.org/education/whatischemistry/landmarks/gas-chromatography-mass-spectrometry.html (accessed 2024-9-30)

(7) Flavor Chemistry Research at the USDA Western Regional Research Center. American Chemical Society National Historic Chemical Landmarks 2024. https://www.acs.org/content/acs/en/education/whatischemistry/landmarks/usda-flavor-chemistry.html (accessed 2024-9-30)

(8) Ettre, L. S. Csaba Horváth and the Development of the First Modern High Performance Liquid Chromatograph. LCGC North Am. 2005, 23 (5), 486–495. https://www.chromatographyonline.com/view/csaba-horv-th-and-development-first-modern-high-performance-liquid-chromatograph

(9) Horváth, C. G.; Preiss, B. A.; Lipsky, S. R. Fast Liquid Chromatography. Investigation of Operating Parameters and the Separation of Nucleotides on Pellicular Ion Exchangers. Anal. Chem. 1967, 39 (12), 1422–1428. DOI: 10.1021/ac60256a003

(10) Ettre, L. S. Jim Waters: The Development of GPC and the First HPLC Instruments. LCGC North Am. 2005, 23(8), 752-761. https://www.chromatographyonline.com/view/jim-waters-development-gpc-and-first-hplc-instruments

(11) Murphy, B. J. 2006. Waters History: The History of Jim Waters and Waters Corporation: 1958 – Present. Waters Library Document WA66666.

(12) Yost, R. A. The Triple Quadrupole: Innovation, Serendipity and Persistence. J. Mass Spectrom. Adv. Clin. Lab. 2022, 24, 90–99. DOI: 10.1016/j.jmsacl.2022.05.001

(13) Yost, R. A.; Enke, C. G. Selected Ion Fragmentation with a Tandem Quadrupole Mass Spectrometer. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 1978, 100 (7), 2274–2275. DOI: 10.1021/ja00475a072

(14) Pittcon Heritage Award. Science History Institute Museum & Library 2024. https://www.sciencehistory.org/about/awards-program/pittcon-heritage-award/ (accessed 2024-9-30)

About the Author

James P. Grinias is an associate professor of chemistry and biochemistry at Rowan University, and a member of the EAB for LCGC International.