Robert Bunsen

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Science & Tech

Robert Bunsen

German chemist

Also known as: Robert Wilhelm Bunsen

Written and fact-checked by The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica

Last Updated: Mar 26, 2024 • Article History

Robert Bunsen

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Category: Science & Tech

In full:: Robert Wilhelm Bunsen

Born:: March 30, 1811, Göttingen, Westphalia [Germany]

Died:: August 16, 1899, Heidelberg (aged 88)

Awards And Honors:: Copley Medal (1860)

Inventions:: photometer; calorimeter

Subjects Of Study:: arsenic poisoning; cesium; rubidium; spectroscopy

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Robert Bunsen (born March 30, 1811, Göttingen, Westphalia [Germany]—died August 16, 1899, Heidelberg) was a German chemist who, with Gustav Kirchhoff, about 1859 observed that each element emits a light of characteristic wavelength. Such studies opened the field of spectrum analysis, which became of great importance in the study of the Sun and stars and also led Bunsen almost immediately to his discovery of two alkali-group metals, cesium and rubidium. After taking a Ph.D. in chemistry at the University of Göttingen (1830), Bunsen taught at the Universities of Marburg and Breslau and elsewhere. As professor at Heidelberg (1852–99), he built ...(100 of 346 words)

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