Interview Questions and Research: Stanislao cannizzaro
Scientist Selected: Stanislao Cannizzaro
Why did you select this scientist? He sounded interesting and I liked his name. I also didn’t know much about him and wanted to learn more.
Basic Info:
- Full Name: Stanislao Cannizzaro
- Country of Birth: Italy
- Birth and death year: 1826-1910
10 Interview Questions:
- What influenced you to go into the field of chemistry?
- What discovery are you most famous for? Why?
- Did you ever take a break from your studies to pursue other interests?
- Where are you from?
- Who did you work with before your career took off?
- Do you prefer working alone or with other scientists? Why?
- How long have you been a scientist?
- What was your research mostly focused on?
- Where did you study?
- What was your family like? Did you ever get married?
Source for Basic Info
Title: Stanislao Cannizzaro
MLA Citation: Whitcombe, Todd W. "Stanislao Cannizzaro." Encyclopedia.com. HighBeam Research, 01 Jan. 2008. Web.
Scientist Interview Question Facts
Source 1 Title: Stanislao Cannizzaro
MLA Citation: "Stanislao Cannizzaro." Facts & Biography. Famous Chemists, 2014. Web.
Source 2 Title: Stanislao Cannizzaro
MLA Citation: "Stanislao Cannizzaro." HowStuffWorks. HowStuffWorks.com, n.d. Web.
Source 3 Title: Cannizzaro, Stanislao
MLA Citation: Whitcombe, Todd W. "Cannizzaro, Stanislao." Encyclopedia.com. HighBeam Research, 01 Jan. 2008. Web.
Interview Question #1: What influenced you to go into the field of chemistry?
- He planned on pursuing medicine as his career, but switched his studies to chemistry after entering his university.
- Studied chemistry for 2 years.
- After years of schooling, studying, war, and exile, in 1851 Cannizzaro accepted a job as a professor of physics, chemistry, and mechanics.
Interview Question #2: What discovery are you most famous for? Why?
- After returning to Italy, he held academic appointments in Alessandria, where he worked out the “Cannizzaro reaction”—the self-oxidation and self-reduction of aldehydes—and Genoa, where he expounded Avogadro’s hypothesis.
- Cannizzaro is famous for his contributions to the debate over molecules, atomic weights and atoms. He supported a theory by Amedeo Avogadro that equivalent volumes of gas that had the same temperature and pressure held equivalent amounts of atoms or molecules.
- He also championed the theory that equivalent gas volumes could be utilized to determine atomic weights. By accomplishing this, he presented an innovative understanding of chemistry.
Interview Question #3: Did you ever take a break from your studies to pursue other interests?
- On break in the summer of 1847, Cannizzaro returned to Palermo with the intention of resuming his studies in the fall. But he changed his mind when he learned about plans for a Sicilian Revolution against the Bourbons.
- Instead of returning to Pisa, he joined the uprising, serving as an artillery officer. The Bourbons were forced to leave Naples in 1848, but even so, the rebellion failed, and Cannizzaro was condemned to death.
- In 1849, he fled to Marseilles but soon moved to Paris.
Interview Question #4: Where are you from?
- Cannizzaro was born in the city of Palermo in Italy.
- Cannizzaro, the youngest of 10 children, was born in Palermo, Sicily. His father, Mariano Cannizzaro, was a magistrate and minister of police. His mother, Anna di Benedetto, was descended from Sicilian aristocracy.
- Cannizzaro’s early education in the schools of Palermo was essentially classical, although it included some mathematics.
Interview Question #5: Who did you work with before your career took off?
- He was the assistant to Raffaele Piria from 1845 to 1846, who was very well-known for his salicin research.
- He was the assistant to Raffaele Piria from 1845 to 1846, who was very well-known for his salicin research.
- He worked with F.S. Cloez, and in 1851, they developed cyanamide by combining ammonia and cyanogen chloride in an ethereal solution.
Interview Question #6: Do you prefer working alone or with other scientists? Why?
- Although Bertagnini died at thirty, he and Cannizzaro, along with Piria, were influential in founding an Italian school of chemistry during the early 1850’s.
- Worked with Stanislaus Cloëz on cyanamide and its derivatives.
- In a functioning laboratory that he established he was able to continue the work on the constitution of natural substances that he had begun with Piria.
Interview Question #7: How long have you been a scientist?
- He enrolled in Palermo’s University in 1841. He planned on making medicine his career, but not long after he entered the university he changed his studies to chemistry. He was the assistant to Raffaele Piria from 1845 to 1846, who was very well-known for his salicin research.
- He spent nearly ten years researching aromatic compounds and working on amines, right up until in 1871.
- During his later years, Cannizzaro received honors and awards from many of the leading scientific societies of Italy and the rest of Europe, including the Copley Medal of the Royal Society in 1891.
Interview Question #8: What was your research mostly focused on?
- He demonstrated how atomic weights of various elements found in volatile substances could be deduced from molecular weights of these substances.
- He also discovered how the unknown vapor densities and atomic weights of these elements can be figured out from their particular heats.
- Cannizzaro is famous for his contributions to the debate over molecules, atomic weights and atoms.
Interview Question #9: Where did you study?
- Cannizzaro received a classical education in the Palermo schools. In 1841, he enrolled at the University of Palermo to study medicine.
- Although he was a medical student, he became interested in chemistry, and in 1845, he accepted a job as a laboratory assistant for Raffaele Piria, professor of chemistry at the University of Pisa, and a leading Italian chemist. For the next two years, Cannizzaro studied chemistry and assisted with investigations of salicin and glucosides.
- Worked at multiple universities and built several laboratories.
Interview Question #10: What was your family like? Did you ever get married?
- The youngest of 10 children.
- His father, Mariano Cannizzaro, was a magistrate and minister of police. His mother, Anna di Benedetto, was descended from Sicilian aristocracy.
- In 1856 or 1857 Cannizzaro married, in Florence, Henrietta Withers, the daughter of an English pastor. They had one daughter and one son, who became an architect.