Hevesy

Georg de Hevesy is credited with establishing the half-life calculation for radionuclides and the tracer experiments used today.

Amares Chatt, FCIC, has been awarded the George Hevesy Medal Award 2001 "for his outstanding and innovative contributions in the field of radioanalytical and nuclear chemistry, in particular for his work on various forms of instrumental, preconcentration and radiochemical activation analysis, and their applications in a wide variety of different medical, environmental and biological research studies." The Hevesy Medal is an international award of excellence in radioanalytical and nuclear chemistry.

It occurred to the Hungarian-born chemist Georg Karl von Hevesy (1885-1966) that it might be possible to use radioactive atoms as tracers.

Just as he was about to start his lecture on receipt of the 1922 Nobel Prize for physics, Bohr learned that back in Copenhagen this theory had passed a serious test as the Hungarian physicist George Hevesy discovered element 72 according to its prescriptions.

The Chemistry Nobelists Name Award Field Year Ernest Rutherford Disintegration of elements and chemistry 1908 of radioactive substances Marie Curie Discovery of radium and 1911 polonium Frederick Soddy Chemistry of radioactive 1921 substances and origin and nature of isotopes Francis Aston Discovery of isotopes of 1922 many elements by mass spectroscopy Harold Urey Discovery of heavy 1934 hydrogen Frederic Joliot & Synthesis of new radio- 1935 Irene Joliot-Curie active elements George de Hevesy Isotopes as tracers in 1943 chemical research Otto Hahn Discovery of atomic 1944 fission Glenn Seaborg & Discoveries of 1951 Edwin McMillan transuranium elements Willard Libby Development of radiocarbon dating 1960

Hevesy, who had introduced the notion of radioactive tracers (see 1918), managed to reduce further the small number of still missing elements.