In photosynthesis, oxygen comes from water: from a 1787 book for women by Monsieur De Fourcroy

• It is now well established that the source ofoxygen in photosynthesis is water. The earliest suggestionpreviously known to us had come from Rene´ BernardWurmser (1930). Here, we highlight an earlier report byMonsieur De Fourcroy (1787), who had already discussedthe broad outlines of such a hypothesis in a book onChemistry written for women. We present here a freetranslation of a passage from this book, with the originaltext in French as an Appendix.

Subject headings

NATURVETENSKAP  -- Biologi -- Biokemi och molekylärbiologi (hsv//swe)

NATURAL SCIENCES  -- Biological Sciences -- Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (hsv//eng)

NATURVETENSKAP  -- Biologi -- Botanik (hsv//swe)

NATURAL SCIENCES  -- Biological Sciences -- Botany (hsv//eng)

Keyword

Antoine Lavoisier

Joseph Priestley

Otto Warburg

Richard Willstätter

René Wurmser

Publication and Content Type

art (subject category)

ref (subject category)