From oxygen to 'Oxygen': CU Nobelist is in his element on the subject of Mme. Lavoisier

David Corson, curator at CornellÕs Kroch Library, holds a travel case that belonged to Marie-Anne Paulze Lavoisier, wife of Antoine Laurent Lavoisier, the ÒfatherÓ of modern chemistry, who was executed in 1794 at the height of the French Revolution. The picture in the background is a print of a portrait of the Lavoisiers, painted in 1788 by Jacques- Louis David. Mme. LavoisierÕs travel case, designed to look like two bound books, is part of the Lavoisier Collection in the Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections in Kroch Library. Frank DiMeo/University Photography

By Franklin Crawford

Oxygen was discovered more than 230 years ago, seized center stage in the 18th-century chemical revolution and is still catching fire today. Oxygen has been the subject of space missions, environmental and biological sciences and of drama.

It also was the subject of an unusual symposium, "It's All About Oxygen," on Feb. 14 at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) meeting in Seattle. Participants approached the subject from historical, theatrical and strictly scientific perspectives, including a presentation on the recent remarkable discovery of the presence of ozone in living cells, its production catalyzed by antibodies. (Ozone is a form of oxygen in which the molecule contains three atoms instead of the normal two.)

The theatrical side of oxygen is embodied in a two-act play, Oxygen, by Cornell's Roald Hoffmann, Nobel laureate in chemistry and the Frank H.T. Rhodes Professor of Humane Letters, and Stanford chemistry professor Carl Djerassi, who discussed the play at the symposium. Oxygen was written in 2000 and has had several productions in the United States, as well as England, Germany, Italy, South Korea and Japan. Hoffmann, however, did not talk about his play at the symposium but about Marie-Anne Pierrette Paulze Lavoisier (1758-1836), the intelligent and gifted wife of the great French chemist Antoine Laurent Lavoisier, the "father" of modern chemistry and the man incorrectly credited by many with the discovery of oxygen. (The English chemist Joseph Priestley is the true claimant.)

Hoffmann

"Mme. Lavoisier deserves an opera," Hoffmann said about his talk, "More About Mme. Lavoisier Than M. Lavoisier." To illustrate his talk, he used images from the Lavoisier Collection at the Kroch Library's Rare and Manuscript Collections at Cornell, the largest collection of materials on the French chemist, outside of Paris. According to Cornell librarian and curator David Corson, the collection's 2,000 books and manuscripts document all aspects of Antoine Lavoisier's career, most notably his crucial work not only with oxygen but also the development of modern chemical nomenclature. Included among the manuscripts are laboratory notes from his dramatic experiments on the decomposition and recomposition of water, which helped to demonstrate the existence of oxygen and its role in chemical reactions.

A treasured piece in the collection is Mme. Lavoisier's travel case or necessaire, which is, incidentally, a crucial and mysterious plot device in the play Oxygen. A good part of the collection documents the life of Mme. Lavoisier, allegedly a talented pupil of neoclassical French painter Jacques-Louis David. Mme. Lavoisier illustrated Antoine Lavoisier's works and translated foreign scientific literature into French for him.

However, Hoffmann asks, although Mme. Lavoisier was the wife of a scientist and was an upper-class woman "of great intelligence and talent" in 18th century France, "What opportunities were open for her to do science?"