Abstract
The date 26 May 1824, when Justus von Liebig was made an ‘extraordinary professor’ of chemistry at the University of Giessen, is for me as momentous an occasion in the history of science as 16 July 1662, when the Charter of Incorporation of the Royal Society passed the Great Seal, making it the official date of that body's foundation. This year marks the two hundredth anniversary of Liebig's birth, and here I describe his long and interdisciplinary scientific career, and in particular his creation of the world's first scientific research and teaching laboratory at Giessen. This essay is in part a review of William H. Brock's biography, Justus von Liebig: The Chemical Gatekeeper.
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