Reactivity of Surfaces

On July 29, 1823, J.W. Doebereiner, professor of chemistry at the University of Jena, informed his minister, J.W. Goethe, about his observation that finely divided platinum causes hydrogen to react with oxygen “by mere contact”, whereby the platinum even starts to glow due to the heat evolved in this process [1.1]. This discovery was a sensation in the scientific world (perhaps comparable to the turmoil about recent reports about the so-called “cold fusion”, with the essential difference that Doebereiner’s effect was real!) and prompted many researchers to further investigations in this field, for which somewhat later Berzelius coined the term “catalysis” [1.2]. A tentative explanation was offered by Faraday [1.3] who speculated:

“dependent upon the natural conditions of gaseous elasticity combined with the exertion of that attractive force possessed by many bodies …; by which they are drawn into association more or less close, … and which occasionally leads to the combination of bodies simultaneously subjected to this attraction”.