Fritz Haber

Fritz Haber was a German physical chemist who made significant contributions to the fields of surface chemistry, thermodynamics, electrochemistry and chemical kinetics. He is best known for his invention of the Haber-Bosch process, a method of synthesizing ammonia from nitrogen and hydrogen gases, which enabled the mass production of fertilizers and explosives. He received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1918 for this achievement. He also developed methods for synthesizing nitric acid from ammonia, which was useful for making explosives and fertilizers as well. He is regarded as one of the most influential chemists and industrialists of the 20th century. Haber was also involved in the development and use of chemical weapons during World War I. He supervised the German poison gas program and advocated for the use of chlorine gas as a weapon to break the stalemate of trench warfare. He personally oversaw the first gas attack at the Second Battle of Ypres in 1915. His involvement in chemical warfare earned him the nickname "the father of chemical warfare" and caused a moral conflict with his wife Clara Immerwahr, who was also a chemist and a pacifist. She committed suicide with his service pistol in 1915, after he returned from the front. Haber was deeply affected by her death, but continued his work for the war effort. After the war, Haber tried to restore his reputation and find ways to pay off the German war reparations. He worked on various projects, such as extracting gold from seawater, creating synthetic fuels and rubber, and developing new insecticides. He also collaborated with other scientists, such as Albert Einstein, Max Planck and Chaim Weizmann. He was a patriotic German and a convert to Christianity, but he faced increasing discrimination and persecution under the Nazi regime because of his Jewish ancestry. He was forced to resign from his positions in 1933 and went into exile. He accepted an offer from Weizmann to become the director of the Sieff Research Institute (now the Weizmann Institute) in Rehovot, Mandatory Palestine. However, he died of heart failure on his way there in a Basel hotel on 29 January 1934, aged 65. His legacy is controversial, as he is seen as both a benefactor and a destroyer of humanity.