View source for Paul Heinrich von Groth

{{Short description|German mineralogist (1843–1927)}}
{{Infobox scientist
| honorific_prefix  =
| birth_date        = {{birth date|1843|06|23}}
| birth_place       = [[Magdeburg]], Germany
| death_date        = {{death_date_and_age|1927|12|02 |1843|06|23}}
| death_place       = [[Munich]], Germany
| name              = Paul Heinrich Ritter von Groth
| image             = [[File:Theodor Hilsdorf - Paul Heinrich von Groth (1910).jpg|frameless]]
| caption           = Paul Heinrich von Groth (1910); photograph by [[Theodor Hilsdorf]]
| education         = [[University of Berlin]]
| doctoral_advisor  = [[Heinrich Gustav Magnus]]
| academic_advisors = [[Gustav Rose]]
| workplaces        = [[Freiberg University of Mining and Technology|Freiberg mining school]]<br>[[University of Berlin]]<br>[[University of Strasbourg|Strasbourg]]<br>[[University of Munich]]
| doctoral_students = [[Waldemar Theodore Schaller]]
| notable_students  = [[Vladimir Vernadsky]]
| website           =
}}
'''Paul Heinrich Ritter von Groth''' (23 June 1843 – 2 December 1927) was a German [[mineralogist]].  His most important contribution to science was his systematic classification of minerals based on their chemical compositions and crystal structures.
==Biography==
[[File:Paul Heinrich von Groth, c. 1898 - Accademia delle Scienze di Torino 0152 B.jpg|thumb|left|Paul Heinrich von Groth, c. 1898]]
He was born at [[Magdeburg]], and educated at [[Freiberg, Saxony|Freiberg]], [[Dresden]] and [[Berlin]], and received the doctorate degree in 1868.<ref name=eb>{{EB1911|wstitle=Groth, Paul Heinrich von|inline=1}}</ref> After lecturing at the [[Freiberg University of Mining and Technology|Freiberg mining school]] and at the [[Humboldt University of Berlin|University of Berlin]],<ref name=nie>{{Cite NIE|wstitle=Groth, Paul|year=1905}}</ref> in 1872 he became professor of mineralogy at [[University of Strasbourg|Strasbourg]].  In 1883, he was appointed professor of mineralogy and curator of [[mineral]]s in the [[Deutsches Museum]] in [[Munich]].<ref name=eb/>
He died in [[Munich]].
==Work==
He carried out extensive research on [[crystal]]s and minerals, and also on [[Rock (geology)|rock]]s.  von Groth published ''Tabellarische Übersicht der einfachen Mineralien'' (1874-1898) and ''Physikalische Krystallographie'' (1876-1895, ed. 4, 1905), the latter of which was influential with the acceptance of crystallographic methods in the field of organic chemistry. In 1877 he founded the journal ''[[Zeitschrift für Krystallographie und Mineralogie]]'', and subsequently served as its editor until 1920.<ref name=eb/> In 1883, Groth compiled a monumental five-volume collection entitled ''Chemische Kristallographie,'' which contained crystalline morphology and physical property data on thousands of substances.
By Groth's time, Dalton's atomic theory was already well established.  In 1888, Groth was the first to suggest the possibility that spherical atoms reside at equivalent positions of space lattices, which gave a physical significance to this still somewhat abstract idea of the regular and symmetric partitioning of space.  The German physicist [[Leonhard Sohncke]] (1842–1897) had previously derived the 65 chiral space groups (i.e. those lacking an inversion center, mirror planes, or improper axes of rotation that invert the handedness of a crystal).  The mathematical descriptions of the complete set of 230 space groups, including their symmetry elements, were thereafter derived independently by [[Arthur Moritz Schönflies|Schönflies]], [[Yevgraf Fyodorov|Fedorov]], and [[William Barlow (geologist)|Barlow]].  Finally, in 1922, [[Ralph Walter Graystone Wyckoff|Ralph Walter Graystone Wyckoff (1897–1994)]] authored ''The Analytical Expression of the Results of the Theory of Space Groups'', a book which contained, among other things, tables with the positional coordinates, both general and special, permitted by the symmetry elements.
==Publications==
===as author===
*''Elemente der physikalischen und chemischen Krystallographie'' (R. Oldenbourg, 1921)
*''Physikalische Krystallographie und Einleitung in die krystallographische Kenntniss der wichtigsten Subtanzen'' (W. Engelmann, 1905)
*''Ueber die Molekularbeschaffenheit der Krystalle. Festrede gehalten in der öffentlichen Sitzung der k.b. Akademie der Wissenschaften zu München zur Feier des einhundert und neunundzwanzigsten Stiftungstages am 28 März 1888'' (München, 1888)
*''Über das studium der Mineralogie auf den Deutschen Hochschulen'' (London, Trübner & Co, 1875)
==References==
{{reflist}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Groth, Paul Heinrich von}}
[[Category:1843 births]]
[[Category:1927 deaths]]
[[Category:German mineralogists]]
[[Category:Wollaston Medal winners]]
[[Category:Foreign members of the Royal Society]]
[[Category:Foreign associates of the National Academy of Sciences]]
[[Category:Academic staff of the University of Strasbourg]]
[[Category:Corresponding members of the Saint Petersburg Academy of Sciences]]
[[Category:Honorary members of the Russian Academy of Sciences (1917–1925)]]
[[Category:Members of the Royal Society of Sciences in Uppsala]]
[[Category:Crystallographers]]