Subject: SUMMARY: POTENTIAL E SURFACE, MARCELIN

From: elewars <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 17 Apr 2001 12:44:16 -0400

2001 April 17

Here are the answers to this question:
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In his textbook "Physical Chemistry", Fourth Ed. (1972), on page 377,
Walter J. Moore (author of the definitive biography of Erwin
Schroedinger, 1989) says: "The idea that a chemical reaction can be
represented by [a potential energy surface] was suggested by Marcelin in
1915..." and gives this reference:
Marcelin, Ann. Phys., 3, 158 (1915).

(1) Who was Marcelin, and what was his initial(s) (A. Marcelin, B.
Marcelin, ...)?
(2) What was Ann. Phys. in 1915--Annalen der Physik, or Annales de
Physique, or what?

If anyone....
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THE ANSWERS:

I thank those who responded: Matt Thompson, Adam Hixson, and Konrad
Hinsen. I summarize the answers here and give the responses below.

R. Marcelin published in Annales de Physique, 1915, 3, 120-231 (!) a
very long paper (perhaps a dissertation) which evidently created much of
transition-state theory about 20 years before the much-better-known work
of Eyring and coworkers. The section most relevant to potential energy
surfaces seems to start on page 158.

Rudolph Marcus, in his Nobel Prize (1992) speech recognizes Marcelin's
work as a milestone: "...Marcelin's classic 1915 theory which came
within one small step of the Transition State Theory of 1935."

Marcelin was apparently killed in 1915, in World War I.

Thanks again to all (below) who responded.

E. Lewars
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#1
Matt Thompson:

Dr. Lewars, here is some info on R. Marcelin, Ann. Phys., 3, 152 (1915).

It is R. Marcelin from "Annales de Physique" and the paper is titled
(sorry for no accents):

"Contribution a l'etude de la cinetique physico-chimique"

It spans pp. 120 - 231.

Page 152 is in Chapter II, Section IV.

The chapter is titled:

"La formule synthetique precedemment obtenue se presente comme une
consequence tres directe de la theorie de l'equipartition."

The section is:

"La formule synthetique obtenue dans le Chapitre precedent est une
consequence du theoreme de Boltzmann-Gibbs."

Essentially, the paper just about had all of transition state theory
correct.  Almost.  I know Rudy Marcus feels it is a very important
paper, see his Nobel biography at
http://www.nobel.se/chemistry/laureates/1992/marcus-autobio.html

Matt Thompson
--
******************************************************************
"And isn't sanity really just a one-trick pony, anyway?  I mean,
all you get is one trick, rational thinking, but when you're good
and crazy, ooh ooh ooh, the sky's the limit!" -- The Tick
******************************************************************
The Matt Thompson -- [email-masked]
                     http://ucsub.colorado.edu/~thompsma/Home.html

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#2
Adam Hixson

The reference is R. Marcelin Annales de physique
3 120-231 1915.

It is the length of a dissertation, but there
is a footnote on the first page:

Tue' a` l'ennemi en sept 1914.

Died in WWI, apparently.  Apparently a student of
P. Duhem, of Gibbs-Duhem fame.

Adam Hixson
Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry
The University of Oklahoma     [email-masked]
620 Parrington Oval            [email-masked]
Norman, OK 73069
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#3
Konrad Hinsen

[This  clears up the journal name (Annales ...), but Google seems to
have got the initial wrong--EL]

Just typing the reference into Google yielded a page with a more
complete reference:

  A. Marcelin, Ann. Phys. (Paris), 3, 158 (1915).

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