Alfred Nobel
19th Century inventor of “Nobel’s safety Powder’
Introduction:
Noble found that when in an
absorbent inert substance like
keiselguhr also known as Diamaceous
earth, Niroglycerin was incorporated, it became safer and more convenient to
handle and this mixture he patented in 1867 as ‘Dynamite”.
Family and Education:
Alfred Nobel was born on 21st
October 1833 at Stockholm.
His father’s name is Immanuel Nobel and mother Andriette Ahlsell Nobel. His father was a engineer and inventor and
moved the family to Finland
and Russia
during Alfred’s youth. Though noble lagged in formal secondary and tertiary
level education. He gained proficiency in six languages namely Swedish, French,
Russian, English, German, Italian. He worked for a varieties of laboratories
and chemical engineering facilities. Noble became particularly very interested
in creating practical uses for Nitroglycerine. Noble found that when in an
absorbent inert substance like Kieselguhr wlso known as Diamaceous earth,
Nitroglycerin was incorporated it became safer and more convenient to handle
and this mixture he patented in 1867 as ‘Dynamite’.
Professional Journey:
Alfred Noble, In Redhill, Surrey
at England,
demonstrated his explosive for the first time at a Quary. He named the highly
powerful substance “Noble’s safety powder to improve the image of his business
and establish his name. Nobel later on combined Nitroglycerin with various
nitrocellulose compounds, similar to collodion, but settled on a more efficient
recipe combining another nitrate explosive, and obtained a transparent,
jelly-like substance, which was a more powerful explosive than dynamite
“Gelignite” or blasting gelatin, as it was named, was patented in 1876; and was
followed by a host of similar combinations, modified by the addition of
potassium nitrate and various other substances. Gelignite was more stable,
transportable and conveniently formed to fit into bored holes like those used
in drilling and mining, than the previously used compounds and was adopted as
the standard technology for the mining in the Age of Engineering bringing Nobel
a great amount of financial success, though at a significant cost to his
health. An off-shoot of this research resulted in Nobel’s invention of
ballisite, the precursor of many modern smokeless powder explosives and still
used as rocket propellant.
Renowned work of AlfredNobel:
Alfred bagan experimenting with
Nitroglycerine creating his first explosions in early summer in 1862. In only a
year, Alfred received a Swedish patent for his persussion detonator- the “Nobel
lighter”. In 1867, Alfred invented a new and safer – to – handle explosive
Dynamite. In 1888, when Alfred’s brother died, a French news paper mistakenly
ran an obituary for Alfred which called him the “Merchant of death”. Not
wanting to go down in history with such a horrible Eaipath, Noble created a
mill that soon shocked his relative and established the now famous Nobel
Prizes. On 27th November, 1895 at the Swedish- Norwegian club in paris, Nobel signed his
last will and testament and set aside the bulk of his estate to establish the
Nobel prizes to be awarded annually without discrimination of nationality. Many
of the companies founded by Nobel have developed into industrial enterprises
that still play a prominent role in the world economy. For example, Imperial Chemical Industries (ICI), Great Britain societe centraule de Dynamite, France and
Dyno Industries in Norway.
Towards the end of his life, he acquired
the company AB Bofors in Karlskoga, where Bjorkborn Manor became his Swedish
home.
