Croatian-Swiss chemist (1887?1976)
Leopold Ru?i?ka
ForMemRS
(
Croatian pronunciation:
[r??it?ka]
;
[3]
born
Lavoslav Stjepan Ru?i?ka
; 13 September 1887 ? 26 September 1976)
[5]
was a Croatian-Swiss scientist and joint winner of the 1939
Nobel Prize in Chemistry
"for his work on
polymethylenes
and higher
terpenes
"
[6]
[7]
"including the first
chemical synthesis
of
male sex hormones
."
[8]
He worked most of his life in Switzerland, and received eight doctorates
honoris causa
in science, medicine, and law; seven prizes and medals; and twenty-four honorary memberships in chemical, biochemical, and other scientific societies.
Early life
[
edit
]
Ru?i?ka was born in
Vukovar
(until 1920 in the
Kingdom of Hungary
,
Austro-Hungarian Empire
, today in
Croatia
). His family of craftsmen and farmers was mostly of
Croat
origin,
[9]
with a
Czech
great-grandparent,
Ru?i?ka
, and a great-grandmother and a great-grandfather from
Austria
.
[6]
He lost his father, Stjepan, at the age of four, and his mother, Amalija Sever, took him and his younger brother Stjepan, to live in
Osijek
.
[5]
Ru?i?ka attended the classics program secondary school in Osijek. He changed his original
idea
of becoming a priest and switched to studying technical disciplines.
[10]
Chemistry
was his choice, probably because he hoped to get a position at the newly opened
sugar refinery
built in Osijek.
[5]
Owing to the excessive hardship of everyday and political life, he left and chose the High Technical School in
Karlsruhe
in Germany. He was a good student in areas he liked and that he thought would be necessary and beneficial in the future, which was
organic chemistry
. That is why his
physical chemistry
professor,
Fritz Haber
(
Nobel laureate
in 1918), opposed his
summa cum laude
degree
. However, in the course of his studies, Ru?i?ka set up excellent cooperation with
Hermann Staudinger
(a
Nobel laureate
in 1953). Studying within Staudinger's department, he obtained his doctoral degree in 1910, then moving to
Zurich
as Staudinger's assistant.
Career in research
[
edit
]
Ru?i?ka's first works originated in the field of chemistry of natural compounds.
[11]
He remained in this field of research all his life. He investigated the ingredients of the
Dalmatian
insect powder
Pyrethrum
(from the herb
Tanacetum cinerariifolium
), a highly esteemed
insecticide
found in
pyrethrins
, which were the focus of his work with Staudinger. Ru?i?ka later said of this time: "Toward the end of five and a half years of mainly synthetic work on the pyrethrins I had come to the firm conclusion that we were barking up the wrong tree." In this way, he came into contact with the chemistry of
Terpineol
, a
fragrant
oil of vegetable origin, interesting to the perfume
industry
. He and Staudinger split company when he started cooperation with the Chuit & Naef Company (later known as
Firmenich
) in
Geneva
.
[10]
[5]
In 1916?1917, he received the support of the oldest perfume manufacturer in the world
Haarman & Reimer
, of
Holzminden
, Germany. He became a Swiss citizen in 1917,
[5]
and published his
Habilitation
in 1918.
[10]
Fornasir and he isolated
linalool
in 1919.
[10]
With expertise in the terpene field, he became senior lecturer in 1918, and in 1923, honorary professor at the
ETH
(Eidgenossische Technische Hochschule) as well the
University of Zurich
. Here, with a group of his doctoral students, he proved the structure of the compounds
muscone
and
civetone
,
macrocyclic
ketone scents derived from the
musk deer
(
Moschus moschiferus
) and the
civet
cat (
Viverra civetta
).
[12]
These were the first
natural products
shown to have rings with more than six atoms, and at the time that Ru?i?ka inferred that civetone as having a 17-member ring.
[13]
Synthetic techniques at the time were only known for rings of up to eight members.
[14]
Muscone had been isolated in 1904
[15]
but was not identified as 3-methylcyclopentadecanone
[16]
until Ru?i?ka suspected a
macrocycle
, having characterised civetone. He also developed a method for synthesising macrocycles, now known as the
Ru?i?ka large ring synthesis
,
[17]
which he demonstrated by preparing civetone in 1927.
[14]
[18]
In 1921, the Geneva perfume manufacturers
Chuit & Naef
asked him to collaborate.
[5]
Working here, Ru?i?ka achieved financial independence, but not as big as he had planned, so he left Zurich to start working for the
Basel
-based
CIBA
.
[
citation needed
]
In 1927, he took over the organic chemistry chair at
Utrecht University
in the Netherlands. In the Netherlands he remained for three years, and then returned to
Switzerland
, which was superior in its chemical industry. A synergistic upheaval in both the administration and chemistry departments coincided to make his good fortune.
[5]
Ru?i?ka was first to synthesize
musk
at an industrial scale. Firmenech named this product
Exaltone
. Other Swiss manufacturers and
DuPont
were in competition with them.
[19]
In 1934, Ru?i?ka synthesized the male hormone
androsterone
and also proved "its constitutional and configurational relation to the
sterols
." This was followed in 1935 by the partial synthesis of the much more active male hormone
testosterone
. Both discoveries led to the pre-eminence of the Swiss industry in the steroid hormone field.
[5]
At ETH Zurich he became professor of organic chemistry and started the most brilliant period of his professional career. He widened the area of his research, adding to it the chemistry of higher terpenes and
steroids
. After the successful synthesis in 1935 of sex
hormones
(
androsterone
and
testosterone
),
[20]
his laboratory became the world center of organic chemistry.
[21]
He was awarded in 1936 an honorary degree from
Harvard University
.
[20]
In 1939 he won the
Nobel prize
for chemistry with
Adolf Butenandt
.
[6]
Over the period 1934?1939 he had published 70 papers in the field of medicinally important steroid sex hormones, and filed several dozen patents besides.
[5]
In 1940, following the award, he was invited by the
Croatian Chemical Association
, where he delivered a lecture to an over packed hall of dignitaries. The topic of the lecture was
From the Dalmatian Insect Powder to Sex Hormones
. In 1940 he became a foreign member of the
Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences
,
[4]
in 1942 he was elected a foreign member of the
Royal Society
,
[5]
and in 1944 he became an international member of the US
National Academy of Sciences
.
[22]
During
World War II
, some of his excellent collaborators were lost, but Ru?i?ka restructured his laboratory with new, younger and promising people; among them was young scientist and future Nobel laureate
Vladimir Prelog
. With new people and ideas new research areas were opened.
In 1946, Ru?i?ka and Lardon "established that the fragrance of
ambergris
is based on the
triterpene
(named)
ambrein
".
[23]
[5]
[8]
Following 1950, Ru?i?ka returned to chemistry, which had entered a new era of research. Now he turned to the field of
biochemistry
, the problems of
evolution
and genesis of life, particularly to the
biogenesis
of terpenes. In 1953, he published his hypothesis, the
Biogenetic Isoprene Rule
(that the carbon skeleton of terpenes is composed variously of regularly or irregularly linked
isoprene
units), which was the peak of his scientific career.
[24]
In 1952,
Oskar Jeger
and he supervised a team which isolated
lanosterol
and established the link between terpenes and steroids.
[25]
Ru?i?ka retired in 1957, turning over the running of the laboratory to Prelog.
[26]
Later life, legacy, honours and awards
[
edit
]
Ru?i?ka was the recipient of eight honorary doctorates and the 1938
Marcel Benoist Prize
.
[5]
He was listed as author on 583 scientific papers.
[5]
In 1965, he became an honorary member of the
Polish Chemical Society
,
[27]
and he was an honorary member of the
American Academy of Arts and Sciences
.
[20]
After the war he acquired a taste for Dutch masterpieces, which he later lodged in the
Kunsthaus Zurich
as the Ru?i?ka collection.
[5]
He militated against
nuclear weapons
.
[28]
In 1970, Ru?i?ka delivered to the
Nobel Laureate Conferences
in
Lindau
a lecture entitled "Nobel Prizes and the chemistry of life".
[5]
In later years, he served as consultant to
Sandoz A. G.
of Basel.
[5]
Ru?i?ka dedicated significant efforts to the problems of education. He insisted on a better organization of academic education and scientific work in the new
Yugoslavia
, and established the
Swiss-Yugoslav Society
. Ru?i?ka became an honorary
academician
at the then
Yugoslav Academy of Sciences and Arts
in
Zagreb
.
In 1974 he was awarded the
Order of the Yugoslav Flag
with Golden Wreath.
[5]
At
ETH Zurich
, the
Ru?i?ka Award
was established in 1957 on the occasion of his retirement, for young chemists working in Switzerland.
[10]
In his native
Vukovar
, a museum was opened in his honour in 1977.
[5]
Ru?i?ka's archives are kept at ETH Zurich.
[28]
The
Ru?i?ka reaction
is named after him.
[29]
Personal life
[
edit
]
Ru?i?ka married twice: to Anna Hausmann in 1912, and 1951 to Gertrud Acklin.
[6]
From 1929, he lived at Freudenbergstrasse 101 until the last years of his life.
[5]
He died in
Mammern
,
Switzerland
, a village on
Lake Constance
at the age of 89.
[20]
References
[
edit
]
- ^
"l?v"
.
Hrvatski jezi?ni portal
(in Croatian)
. Retrieved
19 October
2018
.
L?voslav
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.
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. Retrieved
19 October
2018
.
Stj?p?n
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a
b
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.
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(in Croatian)
. Retrieved
19 October
2018
.
Ru?i?ka
- ^
a
b
"Leopold Stephan Ruzicka (1887?1976)"
.
KNAW Past Members
.
Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences
.
Archived
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. Retrieved
4 August
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.
- ^
a
b
c
d
e
f
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h
i
j
k
l
m
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s
Prelog, Vladimir
; Jeger, Oskar (1980). "Leopold Ruzicka (13 September 1887 ? 26 September 1976)".
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doi
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.
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a
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. Amsterdam:
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.
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.
nobelprize.org
.
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. Retrieved
6 July
2017
.
- ^
"The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1939"
.
- ^
a
b
Hillier, Stephen G.; Lathe, Richard (2019).
"Terpenes, hormones and life: Isoprene rule revisited"
.
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.
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doi
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.
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- ^
His great-grandparents included a Czech, from whom the name Ru?i?ka stems, an Upper Austrian and his wife from Wurtemberg, the other five being Croats
- ^
a
b
c
d
e
Albert Eschenmoser: "Leopold Ruzicka ? From the Isoprene Rule to the Question of Life's Origin" CHIMIA 44 (1990)
- ^
"Leopold Ruzicka (1887?1976)"
. 26 October 2018.
- ^
Sell, Charles S. (1999).
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. In Pybus, David H.; Sell, Charles S. (eds.).
The Chemistry of Fragrances
(1st ed.).
Royal Society of Chemistry Publishing
. pp. 51?124.
ISBN
9780854045280
.
- ^
Ru?i?ka, Leopold (1926). "Zur Kenntnis des Kohlenstoffringes I. Uber die Konstitution des Zibetons".
Helv. Chim. Acta
(in German).
9
(1): 230?248.
doi
:
10.1002/hlca.19260090129
.
- ^
a
b
Agrawal, O. P. (2009).
"Alicyclic Compounds (Sections 7.11 to 7.13)"
.
Organic Chemistry ? Reactions and Reagents
(46th ed.).
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. pp. 237?246.
ISBN
9788187224655
.
- ^
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. In Sell, Charles S. (ed.).
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. pp. 3?23.
ISBN
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.
- ^
Ru?i?ka, Leopold (1926). "Zur Kenntnis des Kohlenstoffringes VII. Uber die Konstitution des Muscons".
Helv. Chim. Acta
(in German).
9
(1): 715?729.
doi
:
10.1002/hlca.19260090197
.
- ^
Ru?i?ka, L.; Stoll, M.; Schinz, H. (1926). "Zur Kenntnis des Kohlenstoffringes II. Synthese der carbocyclischen Ketone vom Zehner- bis zum Achtzehnerring".
Helv. Chim. Acta
.
9
(1): 249?264.
doi
:
10.1002/hlca.19260090130
.
- ^
Ru?i?ka, L.; Schinz, H.; Seidel, C. F. (1927). "Zur Kenntnis des Kohlenstoffringes IX. Uber den Abbau von Zibeton, Zibetol und Zibetan".
Helv. Chim. Acta
(in German).
10
(1): 695?706.
doi
:
10.1002/hlca.19270100188
.
- ^
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(PDF)
.
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a
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.
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- ^
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"ENDOCRINE HISTORY: The history of discovery, synthesis and development of testosterone for clinical use"
.
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.
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.
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Ruzicka, L.; Lardon, F. (1946). "Zur Kenntnis der Triterpene. (105. Mitteilung) Uber das Ambrein, einen Bestandteil des grauen Ambra".
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.
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.
- ^
Ru?i?ka, Leopold (1953). "The isoprene rule and the biogenesis of terpenic compounds".
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.
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.
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.
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.
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Voser, W., M. U. Mijovik, H. Heusser, O. Jeger u. L. Ruzicka: Uber die Konstitution des Lanostadienols (Lanosterins) und seine Zugehorigkeit zu den Steroiden. Helv. chim. Acta 35, 2414 (1952).
- ^
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.
- ^
a
b
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.
- ^
L. Ru?icka; M. Stoll; H. Schinz (1926). "Zur Kenntnis des Kohlenstoffringes II. Synthese der carbocyclischen Ketone vom Zehner- bis zum Achtzehnerring".
Helvetica Chimica Acta
.
9
(1): 249?264.
doi
:
10.1002/hlca.19260090130
.
External links
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