Irving Langmuir was a renowned chemist, physicist, and industrial researcher who worked at the General Electric Company for more than forty years. In addition to developing important improvements to the light bulb and other devices, he made significant contributions to the understanding of chemical forces and reactions that occur at the boundaries between different substances. For his work in this field of research, known as surface chemistry, Langmuir received the 1932 Nobel Prize for chemistry. He was only the second American--and the first scientist employed as an industrial researcher--to attain such an honor.
Langmuir, the third of four sons, was born on January 31, 1881, in Brooklyn, New York, to Charles Langmuir, an insurance executive of Scottish descent, and Sadie Comings Langmuir, the daughter of an anatomy professor and a descendant, on her mother's side of the family, of settlers who came to America on the Mayflower. Langmuir received part of his secondary-school education in France, where his father had been posted for several years. In 1903, Langmuir completed his baccalaureate degree in metallurgical engineering at the Columbia University School of Mines, where he had studied chemistry, physics, and mathematics with equal interest. Thereafter, Langmuir went to the University of Göttingen in Germany to pursue his postgraduate degree. There he studied under noted physical chemist and future Nobel laureate Walther Nernst. Langmuir wrote his doctoral dissertation on the chemical reactions between a glowing platinum wire and hot gases at low pressure; this research formed the foundation for later work at the General Electric Company (GE). Upon returning to the United States in 1906, Langmuir taught chemistry at the Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, New Jersey.
By 1909, Langmuir had become dissatisfied with the lack of research opportunities at the Stevens Institute and applied for a summer job at the GE research laboratory in Schenectady, New York. He began his career with GE at a time when the laboratory gave its professional scientists the freedom to pursue personal research interests whether or not they related to company goals. Langmuir, who valued professional and financial success as well as scientific inquiry and accomplishment, was well suited for work at GE, and his summer position stretched into a lifelong career. He became known among his colleagues for his analytical mind, creativity, ambition, and excellent research skills.
Langmuir's first assignment at the laboratory was to help perfect a new type of electric lamp (light bulb ), one that used a tungsten metal wire as a light emitter instead of the more fragile carbon filament pioneered by Thomas Edison and others. Scientists at the time thought that the tungsten filament would work best if a vacuum were created in the glass bulb. Over time, however, the tungsten filament became brittle when set aglow by electric current; it also blackened the inside of the bulb. Langmuir began to study the problem, and within four years, he found that the lamp's lifetime and efficiency could be improved greatly by filling the bulb with a mixture of inert gases (nitrogen and argon, for example) and by using a coiled filament. The result was a more energy-efficient and longer-lasting light bulb, for which Langmuir received a patent in 1916. The new light bulb design was extremely profitable for GE and saved its customers millions of dollars on their electric bills.
Early in his tenure at GE, Langmuir also studied vacuum tubes, which were becoming increasingly important to developments in radio broadcasting and the control of electrical power--innovations that would revolutionize society in Langmuir's lifetime. His research led him to invent an enhanced vacuum pump that was one hundred-fold more powerful than any existing vacuum pump. The new pump greatly improved the manufacture of vacuum tubes and was widely used by industry. Langmuir's other technical contributions include a hydrogen welding torch, an improved electric stove, and a new kind of gauge for measuring gas concentrations.
In later years at GE, Langmuir continued his research in several other important areas. He developed theories explaining chemical reactions of gases at high temperature and low pressure. He also devised useful explanations about the structure of the atom. Langmuir's studies of electricity's effects on gases prompted him to coin the term "plasma" for the unstable mixture produced when gases are charged with large amounts of electricity. Langmuir's plasma research paved the way for scientific progress in physics, astrophysics, and thermonuclear fusion (atomic reactions used in nuclear weapons and energy).
Langmuir's most acclaimed work was perhaps in the field of surface chemistry. He studied and defined principles of adsorption, the phenomenon he observed in the tendency of gas molecules to cling in a single layer to surfaces of liquids or solids, and in the behavior of thin films of oil on the surfaces of liquids. Langmuir's body of experimental techniques and theories had applications in many fields, including biology, chemistry, and optics. For his contributions in surface chemistry, Langmuir won the Nobel Prize in 1932. In that same year he became assistant director of the GE laboratory, the position he held until he retired in 1950.
Beginning in 1938, Langmuir increasingly turned his attention to atmospheric science and meteorology, lifelong interests he pursued even after his retirement. During World War II, he investigated methods of aircraft de-icing and invented a machine to produce smoke screens that would shield troops from enemy observation. Later, as head of Cirrus, a joint program of the United States Army Signal Corps, the Navy, and the Air Force, Langmuir helped develop ways of seeding clouds with dry ice and silver iodide to make rain and snow.
Langmuir married Marion Mersereau in 1912 and adopted two children, Kenneth and Barbara. In his leisure time, he hiked, sailed, and piloted his own plane, once observing a solar eclipse from an altitude of nine thousand feet. His interest in the world extended well beyond the realm of atoms and molecules to mountain climbing and classical music. In 1935 he ran (unsuccessfully) for a seat on the city council of Schenectady, New York. He actively supported wilderness conservation and control of atomic energy. Achieving celebrity in his own time, Langmuir was also a popular public speaker. He received numerous awards and medals, fifteen honorary degrees, and sixty-three patents. He wrote more than two hundred scientific papers and reports from 1906 to 1956, and since 1985, his name has been honored as the title of the American Chemical Society's journal of surfaces and colloids. Upon his death from a heart attack in Massachusetts on August 16, 1957, the New York Times ran his obituary on the front page.
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