Roberto Duarte Silva | |
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| Born | 25 February 1837 Ribeira Grande, Santo Antão, Portuguese Cape Verde |
| Died | 2 August 1889 (aged 52) Paris, France |
| Nationality | French |
| Alma mater | University of Lisbon |
| Awards | Jecker Prize (1885) |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Chemistry |
Roberto Duarte da Silva (25 February 1837, Ribeira Grande, Cape Verde - 8 February 1889, Paris) was a Cape Verdean chemist.
Duarte Silva began at the age of 14 as an apprentice in a pharmacy. Later he came to Lisbon to work in the Farmácia Azevedo, and studied at the School of Pharmacy (Escola de Farmácia) of the University of Lisbon, there, he also received his alma mater. For some years he lived in Macau and Hong Kong, where he founded his own pharmacy. [1] He studied the compounds of amyl bases and propylamine at the laboratory of Charles Adolphe Wurtz, and achieved total synthesis of glycerine at a laboratory of Charles Friedel.
In 1863 he went to Paris, and taught analytical chemistry at the École des Mines de Paris (now the Mines ParisTech), the Ecole Centrale des Arts et Manufactures (now the École Centrale Paris), and the École supérieure de physique et de Chimie industrial de la ville de Paris from 1882 until his death. Through these years he taught and was active in research, especially in the field of organic chemistry. [1] [2]
Duarte Silva was presented with the Jecker Prize (Prix Jecker) by the French Academy of Sciences in 1885. In 1887 he became president of the Société Chimique de France. Among his students was chemist Charles Lepierre, who settled in 1888 at his suggestion in Portugal. [3] A street is named in his honor in São Domingos de Benfica, in Lisbon. [4]
Since 2007, he is featured on a Cape Verdean $500 escudos banknote.
A plaque is commemorated at his former house in Ribeira Grande. The plaque reads in Portuguese, it is translated into English as "Here Roberto Duarte Silva was born, notable Cape Verdean chemist, 1837-1889".
Praia is the capital and largest city of Cape Verde. Located on the southern coast of Santiago island, within the Sotavento Islands group, the city is the seat of the Praia Municipality. Praia is the economic, political, and cultural center of Cape Verde.
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São Vicente is one of the Barlavento Islands, the northern group within the Cape Verde archipelago in the Atlantic Ocean, off the West African coast. It is located between the islands of Santo Antão and Santa Luzia, with the Canal de São Vicente separating it from Santo Antão.
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Charles Adolphe Wurtz was an Alsatian French chemist. He is best remembered for his decades-long advocacy for the atomic theory and for ideas about the structures of chemical compounds, against the skeptical opinions of chemists such as Marcellin Berthelot and Henri Étienne Sainte-Claire Deville. He is well known by organic chemists for the Wurtz reaction, to form carbon-carbon bonds by reacting alkyl halides with sodium, and for his discoveries of ethylamine, ethylene glycol, and the aldol reaction. Wurtz was also an influential writer and educator.
Santo Antão is the westernmost island of Cape Verde. At 785 km2 (303 sq mi), it is the largest of the Barlavento Islands group, and the second largest island of Cape Verde. The nearest island is São Vicente to the southeast, separated by the sea channel Canal de São Vicente. Its population was 38,200 in mid 2019, making it the fourth most populous island of Cape Verde after Santiago, São Vicente and Sal. Its largest city is Porto Novo located on the southern coast.
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