Gold Ounce Medal Jaroslav Heyrovský 2009 Proof

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Jaroslav Heyrovský

Czech scientist, physical chemist, discoverer of polarography Jaroslav Heyrovský was born on 20 December 1890 in Prague as the fifth child in the family of a professor of Roman law at Charles University. From his youth he was interested in natural sciences and made his first chemical experiments. He studied at the Academic Gymnasium in Prague, where his interest focused mainly on physics, chemistry and methematics.

In 1909 he enrolled at the Faculty of Philosophy of Charles University (mathematics, physics, chemistry), but the following year he studied at University College London. He received his bachelor's degree in 1913 and began work on his dissertation. However, his studies were interrupted by World War I. He enlisted in a medical unit, where he spent the entire war. In 1918 he submitted his doctoral thesis to Charles University. During the rigorosum examination he became familiar with the mercury drop electrode, which was used to measure the surface tension of mercury. He worked hard on this problem for several years.

His efforts were crowned on 10 February 1922 when he discovered the mercury drop electrode electrolysis, an electrochemical method used mainly for chemical analysis. Heyrovsky was aware of the importance of this discovery and immediately began further research with a group of collaborators. His discovery, called polarography from 1925 onwards, aroused interest throughout the world. In 1922 he was appointed extraordinary professor and in 1926 the first full professor of physical chemistry at Charles University. In the same year, he and a Japanese collaborator constructed the polarograph, an instrument for the automatic registration of measured quantities.

From 1952 he was professor and in 1950-63 director of the Institute of Polarography of the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences. For his discovery of the polarographic method and its application to analytical chemistry, he received on 10 December 1959 from King Gustav VI of Sweden the award of the Sakharov Prize. He was awarded the Nobel Prize by the King of Sweden on the 10th anniversary of his birth.

He received many honorary doctorates and other awards. He disseminated polarography - which became the greatest contribution of Czechoslovak science to world science in the twentieth century - not only in Czechoslovakia but also in lectures in many countries: in the United States (1933), in the Soviet Union (1934), in England (1946), in Sweden (1947), in the People's Republic of China (1958) and in the United Arab Republic - Egypt - (1960 and 1961).

Jaroslav Heyrovský died in Prague on 27 March 1967 and is buried at Vyšehrad.