Cyril Hinshelwood
Hinshelwood, Cyril (1897-1967) was a British chemist. He won the 1956 Nobel Prize in chemistry for his work in chemical kinetics —the study of the conditions under which chemical reactions occur when molecules are in motion, and its application to bacterial cells. He shared the prize with the Soviet chemist Nikolai N. Semenov, whose ideas Hinshelwood used in his explanation.
Hinshelwood was born on June 19, 1897, in London. During World War I (1914–1918), he worked as a chemist in a British explosives factory. His work on solid explosives inspired his interest in chemical kinetics. Hinshelwood received a bachelor's degree in 1920 and a master's degree in 1924 from Oxford University. He was a tutor at the University's Trinity College from 1921 to 1937 and, from 1937, a professor of chemistry at Oxford until 1964. During World War II (1939–1945), Hinshelwood carried out important research that led to the improvement of gas masks.
At Oxford, during the 1920's, Hinshelwood began to apply kinetic theory to the chemical reactions that occurred in gases. He studied the interaction between oxygen and hydrogen that produces water. He discovered that at a certain pressure point, this interaction triggered a violent explosion in a chain reaction. He also found that such a chain reaction could branch off into further chain reactions and explosions. Hinshelwood published his findings in his 1926 book Kinetics of Chemical Change in Gaseous Systems.
In addition to his Nobel Prize, Hinshelwood received numerous honors and awards. In 1929, he was elected a fellow (member) of the Royal Society, the leading scientific organization in the United Kingdom. He was knighted in 1948.
In 1964, Hinshelwood retired from his chair at Oxford and became a senior research fellow at Imperial College in London, where he continued his study of bacterial growth until his death.
Hinshelwood never married. He died on Oct. 9, 1967, in London.