Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-m8qmq Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-23T12:53:58.124Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Science as Receptor of Technology: Paul Ehrlich and the Synthetic Dyestuffs Industry

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 September 2008

Anthony S. Travis
Anthony S. Travis
Affiliation:
Sidney M. Edelstein Center for the History and Philosophy of ScienceTechnology and MedicineThe Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

In Germany during the 1870s and 1880s a number of important scientific innovations in chemistry and biology emerged that were linked to advances in the new technology of synthetic dyestuffs. In particular, the rapid development of classical organic chemistry was a consequence of programs in which chemists devised new theories and experimental strategies that were applicable to the processes and products of the burgeoning dye factories. Thereafter, the novel products became the means to examine and measure biological systems. This took place as a result of two trends. The first was a move toward diversification in the dye industry – made possible by the extensive range of products – which in turn was stimulated by economic and political conditions. The second was the increasing availability of techniques, substances, and processes used in industry. This made possible a concrete program of introducing the qualitative and quantitative methods of chemistry into the domain of laboratory experimentation on biological materials, thereby realizing the abstract desire to transform cell biology into an exact science.

Moreover, the conceptualization of biological systems that emerged from this endeavor leaned heavily on a theory of dye chemistry that indicated which particular arrangements of atoms performed specific functions. This biological modeling used the imagery of chemical structural formulae to transform chemical nuclei and their side chains (substituents) into adequate representations of protoplasmic structure.

Type
Research Article
Information
Science in Context , Volume 3 , Issue 2 , Autumn 1989 , pp. 383 - 408
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1989

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Beer, John J. [1959] 1981. The Emergence of the German Dye Industry. Urbana: University of Illinois Press; New York: Arno (reprint).Google Scholar
Ben-David, Joseph. 1960. “Roles and Innovations in Medicine.” American Journal of Sociology 65:557–68.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ehrlich, Paul 1956–1960. The Collected Papers of Paul Ehrlich, 3vols. Edited by Himmelweit, Freddy,Marquardt, Martha, and Dale, Henry Oxford: Pergamon.Google Scholar
Ehrlich, Paul. [1878] 1956–60. Contributions to the Theory and Practice of Histological Staining, translated from German. Doctoral dissertation, University of Leipzig. Reprinted in Ehrlich 1956–60, 1:65–98.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ehrlich, Paul [1885] 1956–60. The Requirement of the Organism for Oxygen: An Analytical Study with the Aid of Dyes, translated from German. Berlin: Hirshwald. Reprinted in Ehrlich 1956–60, 1:433–96.Google Scholar
Ehrlich, Paul [1906] 1956–60. “Address Delivered at the Dedication of the Georg-Speyer-Haus” (6 September 1906). Reprinted in Ehrlich 1956–60, 3:53–63.Google Scholar
Fruton, Joseph F. 1972. Molecules and Life: Historical Essays on the Interplay of Chemistry and Biology. New York: Wiley Interscience.Google Scholar
Hornix, Willem J. 1985. “Dyestuffs and the Development of Organic Chemistry: The Synthesis of Alizarin.” Lecture delivered to the Seventeenth International Congress of History of Science, University of California, 1985.Google Scholar
Hunt, , Bruce, J. 1983. “Practice Vs. Theory: The British Electrical Debate, 1888–1891.” Isis 74:341–55.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hunt, , Bruce, J. 1986. “Experimenting in the Ether: Oliver J. Lodge and the Great Whirling Machine.” Historical Studies in the Physical and Biological Sciences 16:111–34.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ihde, Aaron J. 1964. The Development of Modern Chemistry. New York: Harper and Row.Google Scholar
Keilin, David. 1966. The History of Cell Respiration and Cytochrome. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Lenoir, Timothy. 1986. “Models and Instruments in the Development of Electrophysiology, 1845–1912.” Historical Studies in the Physical and Biological Sciences 17:1–54.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Lenoir, Timothy. 1988. “A Magic Bullet: Research for Profit and the Growth of Knowledge in Germany around 1900.” Minerva 26:66–88.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mazumdar, Pauline M.H. 1974. “The Antigen-Antibody Reaction and the Physics and Chemistry of Life.” Bulletin of the History of Medicine 48:1–21.Google ScholarPubMed
Parascandola, John, and Jasensky, Ronald 1974. “Origins of the Receptor Theory of Drug Action.” Bulletin of the History of Medicine 48:199–220.Google ScholarPubMed
Rocke, Alan J. 1985. “Hypothesis and Experiment in the Early Development of Kekulé's Benzene Theory.” Annals of Science 42:355–81.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stokes, Geroge G. 1864. “Reduction and Oxidation of the Colouring Matter of the Blood.” Proceedings of the Royal Society of London 13:355–64.Google Scholar
Travis, Anthony S. 1988. “William Perkin: A Teenage Chemist Discovers How to Make the First Synthetic Dye.” Textile Chemist and Colorist 20:13–18.Google Scholar
Travis, Anthony S. 1990. “Perkin's Mauve: Ancestor of the Organic Chemical Industry.” Technology and Culture 31:51–82.Google Scholar
Wilcox, David H. Jr, 1961. “Kekulé and the Dye Industry.” In Kekulé Centennial, ed. Gould., Robert F. Advances in Chemistry Series, no. 61. Washington, DC: American Chemical Society.Google Scholar
Witkop, Bernhard 1982. “Paul Ehrlich: His Ideas and His Legacy.” In Science, Technology and Society in the Time of Alfred Nobel, eds. Bernhard, Carl G., Crawford, Elizabeth and Sörbom, Per. Oxford: Pergamon.Google Scholar
Witt, Otto N. 1876. “Zur Kentniss des Baues und der Bildung färbender Kohlen-stoffverbindungen.” Berichte der Deutschen Chemischen Gesellschaft 9:522–27.CrossRefGoogle Scholar