Otto Diels
Diels, Otto (1876-1954) was a German organic chemist. He shared the Nobel Prize in chemistry in 1950 with a student. Kurt Alder, for discovering what became known as the Diels-Alder reaction. The reaction involves a synthesis between a molecule containing a double bond a second molecule containing two adjacent double bonds. Diels's work also led to the discovery of the structure of cholesterol.
Diels was born on Jan. 23, 1876, in Hamburg, Germany. He became interested in chemistry as a teen-ager. In 1895, he entered Friedrich Wilhelm University in Berlin to study chemistry. He received his doctorate in 1899. After graduation, he stayed at the university to conduct research until becoming a lecturer in organic chemistry in 1904, an assistant professor in 1906, and head of the university's organic chemistry department in 1913. In 1916. Diels was asked by the Christian Albrecht University in Kiel to be full professor and director of its Chemical Institute. Diels accepted and stayed there 32 years, until his retirement.
In 1906, Diels made his first major discovery. While working on a project, he dehydrated diethyl malonate with phosphorus pentoxide, producing, to his surprise, a foul-smelling gas. He discovered that the gas was a new oxide of carbon. He named the compound carbon suboxide. In 1903, Diels began to study cholesterol. In an attempt to discover the molecular structure of cholesterol, he isolated pure cholesterol from gall stones. In 1927, he successfully dehydrogenated cholesterol. In 1935, he synthesized it. This work was the turning point for understanding the chemistry of cholesterol and other steroids.
Diels, along with Alder, devoted a good deal of time to developing the Diels-Alder reaction. There are numerous applications for the reaction in organic chemistry. The Allies and the Germans used the reaction during World War II (1939-1945) to produce a synthetic rubber. It is for their discovery of the Diels-Alder reaction that the two shared the 1950 Nobel Prize in chemistry.
In 1909, Diels married Paula Geyer. They had five children. Diels died of a heart attack in Kiel in 1954.