Gustaf Komppa, Date of Birth, Place of Birth, Date of Death

    

Gustaf Komppa

Finnish chemist

Date of Birth: 28-Jul-1867

Place of Birth: Vyborg, Leningrad Oblast, Russia

Date of Death: 20-Jan-1949

Profession: chemist

Nationality: Finland

Zodiac Sign: Leo


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About Gustaf Komppa

  • Gustaf Komppa (28 July 1867 in Viipuri – 20 January 1949 in Helsinki) was a Finnish chemist best known for a world-first in commercializing total synthesis, that of camphor in 1903. Komppa was born in Viipuri in 1867.
  • While in the secondary school in Viborg, Hugo Zilliacus, the teacher of arithmetic and science, cemented Komppa's interest in scientific research.
  • Komppa furnished his own chemistry laboratory in the carriage shed of his parents' house after the instructions in Julius Adolph Stöckhard's book Schule der Chemie.
  • He graduated from the Helsinki University of Technology in 1891 and subsequently worked for a while in Switzerland with Arthur Hantzsch before obtaining his Ph.D.
  • Shortly after returning to Finland he became the professor of chemistry at the Helsinki University of Technology.
  • From 1935 to 1945 he was chancellor of the University of Turku.
  • He was also a board member in several major Finnish corporations and a founding member of Finnish Academy of Science and Letters.
  • Universities of Uppsala, Copenhagen and Heidelberg invited him as an honorary doctor. Komppa worked extensively with organic synthesis of several compounds, most notably camphor and terpenoids.
  • The camphor synthesis was an important breakthrough, especially because he proceeded to commercialize a semisynthesis from tall oil-derived pinene.
  • He also developed methods for converting peat into fuel.
  • During his career Komppa published more than 200 research papers.

Read more at Wikipedia