Bernhard Tollens

Infobox_Scientist
name = Bernhard Tollens


image_width = 200px
caption = Bernhard Tollens
birth_date = birth date|1841|7|30
birth_place = Hamburg, Germany
residence =
nationality =
death_date = death date and age|1918|1|31|1841|7|30
death_place = Göttingen, Germany
field =
work_institution =
alma_mater = University of Göttingen
doctoral_advisor =
doctoral_students = Emil Votoček
known_for =
prizes =
religion =
footnotes =

Bernhard Christian Gottfried Tollens was a German chemist.

Tollens attended school at the Johanneum High School in Hamburg where he was influenced by his science teacher, Karl Möbius. After graduating in 1857, Tollens started an apprenticeship in pharmacy. He finished in 1862 and began studying chemistry in Göttingen in Wöhler's laboratory, then supervised by Friedrich Konrad Beilstein and Rudolph Fittig. In 1864, Tollens submitted his thesis and received his PhD without a defense. The latter was possible through the intercession of Wöhler so that Tollens could accept and begin an attractive job at a bronze factory. However, Tollens left the job after only six months and joined the group of Emil Erlenmeyer at the University of Heidelberg for six months. He later worked with Charles-Adolphe Wurtz in Paris and, for 11 months, was chief of the chemical laboratory at the University in the Portuguese capital Coimbra. [*cite journal | author = Browne, C. A. | journal = Journal of Chemical Education | volume = 19 | pages = 253–259 | year = 1941 | title = Bernhard Tollens (1841-1918) and Some American Students of his School of Agricultural Chemistry]

Unable to resist the call of Wöhler, his former professor, Tollens returned to Göttingen in 1872 and there he remained in various positions until his death in 1918. It was during this final time in Göttingen that he started his work on carbohydrates, which yielded structures of several sugars, the Tollens reagent, and most of his publications.

References

Further reading

*cite journal
journal = Berichte der deutschen chemischen Gesellschaft
volume = 51,
issue = 2
pages = 1539–1555
year = 1918
title = Nekrolog : Bernhard Tollens
author = Wallach, Otto
doi = 10.1002/cber.19180510244

*cite journal
journal = Journal of Chemical Education
volume = 19
issue =
pages = 253–259
year = 1942
title = Bernhard Tollens (1841-1918) and Some American Students of his School of Agricultural Chemistry
author = Browne, C. A.
doi =