Antoine François Fourcroy (; 15 June 175516 December 1809) Fourcroy's attention was turned specifically to chemistry by J. B. M. Bucquet (1746–1780), the professor of chemistry at the Medical School of Paris. In 1784 Fourcroy was chosen to succeed P. J. Macquer (1718–1784) as lecturer in chemistry at the college of the Jardin du Roi, where his lectures attained great popularity.

Works

left|thumb|Last work published by Foucroy before his death, the "Système des connaissances chimiques et de leurs applications aux phénomènes de la nature et de l'art", 1801.

Chemical Work

Fourcroy was one of the earliest converts to the views of Lavoisier, which he helped to make widely known by his own voluminous writings.

Biological and Neurochemical Work

Fourcroy's views and studies grew from Bucquet. Fourcroy was a critic of earlier use of chemistry in medicine and saw great importance in studying the chemical materials of plants and animals, particularly for medicinal use.alt=|thumb|upright|A marble bust of Fourcroy designed by [[Antoine-Denis Chaudet and completed by Pierre Cartellier in 1811.]]

Fourcroy also had a prominent role in developing law that would affect medical education in France. Fourcroy collaborated with physician Francois Chaussier to create a report that would be the basis of the Law of 1794, which integrated medicine and surgery and established health schools that taught both of these fields to all students. Prior to this law, medical education was heterogeneous throughout France, with several different colleges and universities operating under varying standards. The law pushed by Fourcroy unified the French medical education system under centralized authority, and led to the issuing of national licensing years later.

Work in Laboratory and Medical Clinic Procedure

While observing the 18th century clinics of Fourcroy’s time, he observed several problems. Fourcroy noticed that physicians got accustomed to seeing the diseases of an individual patient but failed in considering a large number of cases comparatively. There was also practical problems with this idea, as physician’s individual practices were insufficient in accommodating for large numbers of people with large varieties of issues. To deal with this Fourcroy proposed a program in 1791 to establish more effective clinical laboratories. It was Fourcroy who had initially noted the division that chemistry had undergone from natural history, concluding that the two studies no longer shared objectives nor methods. While natural historians of his era merely described and preserved that which they studied, as Fourcroy believed, it was chemists who now sought to uncover the most fundamental structures of the natural world by experimental analysis. In his publications, Fourcroy referred to many other contemporary chemists as well as those from other nations, proposing that the extensive chemical reform being done was a collaborative effort.

Awards and honors

In 1801, Fourcroy was elected a foreign member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.

On 16 December 1809, the very day on which he died in Paris, Fourcroy was created a count of the French empire. was honored by a Citation for Chemical Breakthrough Award from the Division of History of Chemistry of the American Chemical Society, presented at the Académie des Sciences (Paris) in 2015.

thumb|Title page of a 1787 copy of "Méthode de Nomenclature Chimique"

It is believed that Cape Fourcroy, at the western tip of Bathurst Island, Northern Territory, Australia, is named after Fourcroy. The cape was named during Baudin's expedition to Australia, and it is known that Baudin had a copy of one of Fourcroy's texts with him on the Géographe.

Controversy

By his conduct as a member of the Convention, Fourcroy has been accused of contributing to Lavoisier's death. Baron Cuvier, in his Eloge historique of Fourcroy, repelled such charges. According to the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition: although active, though secret, participation cannot be proved against Fourcroy, "he can scarcely be acquitted of time-serving indifference."

Bibliography

  • Louis Bernard Guyton de Morveau, Jean-Henri Hassenfratz, Antoine-François Fourcroy, Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier, Pierre-Auguste Adet, Claude Louis Bertholet Méthode de nomenclature chimique (Paris, 1787)
  • Fourcroy, A. The Philosophy of Chemistry (1792)
  • Fourcroy, A. A General System of Chemical Knowledge (11 volumes, 1801–1802)
  • Kersaint, G. Mémoires du Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle, Antoine François de Fourcroy, sa vie et son oeuvre, Editions du Muséum, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1966, p. 59
  • Smeaton, W. "Fourcroy, 1755 -1809", Heffer & Sons, Cambridge, 1962, p. 58 – Discusses reasonable evidence that Fourcroy not only saved several physicians/scientists but also that he tried to save Lavoisier at the cost of his own safety

References

  • Digital version of Entomologia Parisiensis at Gallica
  • Scanned works by Fourcroy