Mikhail Tsvet
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{{Infobox Scientist
|name = Mikhail Tsvet
|box_width =
|image = Tsvet_ms.jpg
|image_width =150px
|caption = Mikhail Tsvet
|birth_date = 1872
|birth_place = [[Asti]], [[Italy]]
|death_date = [[26 Jun]] [[1919]]
|death_place =
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|nationality = [[Russia]]
|ethnicity =
|field = [[botany]]
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|known_for = [[adsorption chromatography]]
|author_abbrev_bot =
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}}
'''Mikhail Semyonovich Tsvet''' (Михаил Семенович Цвет, also spelled '''Tsvett''', '''Tswett''', '''Tswet''', '''Zwet''', and '''Cvet''') (1872–1919) was a [[Russia]]n [[botanist]] who invented [[adsorption chromatography]]. In [[Russian language|Russian]], his last name can be translated as "color".
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==Biography==
Mikhail Tsvet was born May 14, 1872 in [[Asti]], [[Italy]]. His mother was [[Italy|Italian]], and his father was a [[Russia]]n official. His mother died soon after his birth and he grew up in [[Geneva]], [[Switzerland]]. He received his [[Bachelor of Science|B.S.]] degree from the Department of Physics and Mathematics at the [[University of Geneva]] in 1893. However, he decided to dedicate himself to [[botany]] and received his [[Doctor of Philosophy|Ph.D.]] degree in 1896 for his work on [[cell (biology)|cell]] [[physiology]]. He moved to [[Saint Petersburg|St. Petersburg]], Russia, in 1896 because his father was recalled from the foreign service. There he started to work at the Biological Laboratory of the [[Russian Academy of Sciences]]. His Geneva degrees were not recognized in Russia, and he had to earn Russian degrees. In 1897 he became a teacher of botany courses for women. In 1902 he became a laboratory assistant at the Institute of Plant Physiology of the [[Warsaw University]] in [[Poland]]. In 1903 he became an assistant professor and taught also at other [[Warsaw]] universities. After the beginning of [[World War I]] the [[Warsaw University of Technology]] was evacuated to [[Moscow]], Russia, and in 1916 again to [[Leninskie Gorki|Gorki]] near Moscow. In 1917 he became a Professor of Botany and the director of the [[botanical garden]]s at the [[University of Tartu]] (Yuryev) in [[Estonia]]. In 1918 when [[Germany|German]] troops occupied the city, the university was evacuated to [[Voronezh]], a large city in the south of [[Central Russia]]. Tsvet died of a chronic inflammation of the throat on [[26 June]] 1919 at the age of 47.
==Chromatography==
Mikhail Tsvet invented chromatography in 1901 during his research on plant [[pigment]]s. He used liquid-adsorption [[column chromatography]] with [[calcium carbonate]] as [[adsorbent]] and [[petrol ether]] / [[ethanol]] mixtures as [[eluent]] to separate [[chlorophyll]]s and [[carotenoid]]s. The method was described on [[30 December]] [[1901]] at the XI Congress of Naturalists and Physicians (XI съезд естествоиспытателей и врачей) in St. Petersburg. The first printed description was in 1903, in the Proceedings of the Warsaw Society of Naturalists, biology section. He first used the term "chromatography" in print in 1906 in his two papers about chlorophyll in the German botanical journal, ''Berichte der Deutschen botanischen Gesellschaft''. In 1907 he demonstrated his chromatogaph for the German Botanical Society.
Tsvet's work was ignored for several decades because of diverse reasons: the tragic events in Russia at the beginning of the 20th century, the fact that Tsvet originally published only in Russian (what made his results inaccessible to western scientists) and an article denying Tsvet's findings. Willstater and Stoll tried to repeat Tsvet's experiments but because they used an aggressive adsorbent (what destroys the chlorophyll's) were not able to do so. They published their results and Tsvet's chromatography method went into oblivion. It was recollected 10 years after his death thanks to German scientist [[Edgar Lederer]] and Austrian [[biochemist]] [[Richard Kuhn]] and the work of Martin and Synge.
==Botanical author abbreviation==
The standard [[Binomial nomenclature#Authorship in scientific names|botanical author abbreviation]] '''Tswett''' is applied to [[plants]] he described.
==References==
* Симон Шноль (Simon Schnoll), ''Герои и злодеи советской науки'' (''Heroes and Villains of Soviet Science''), [[Moscow]], Kron-press (Крон-пресс), 1997.
* E. M. Senchenkova, Tsvet (or Tswett), Mikhail Semenovich (1872 - 1919). In: Ch. C. Gillispie (Ed.), Dictionary of scientific biography. American Council of Learned Societies, Charles Scribner Sons, New York, 13: 486-488 (1976)
* R. P. W. Scott, ''Liquid Chromatography'', published by library4science (2003)
* A. J. P. Martin, R. L. M. Synge, Biochemistry Journal, 35, 1358 (1941)
* R. Willstater, A. Stoll, Untersuchungen über Chlorophyll , Springer, Berlin (1913)
*{{Citation
|id = [[PMID]]:4885242
|url= http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/4885242
|last=Ostrowski
|first=W
|publication-date=1968
|year=1968
|title=Michael S. Tswett--inventor of column chromatography. (On the occasion of 65th anniversary of his lecture on the column chromatography technique).
|volume=16
|issue=4
|periodical=Folia Biol. (Krakow)
|pages=429-48
}}
==External links==
* [http://www.uni-kiel.de/anorg/lagaly/group/klausSchiver/Feigl.pdf Biography of Mikhail S. Tsvet] (pdf, in German)
* [http://web.lemoyne.edu/~giunta/tswett.html Mikhail S. Tsvet: Physical chemical studies on chlorophyll adsorptions] Berichte der Deutschen botanischen Gesellschaft 24, 316-323 (1906)
[[Category:Russian botanists|Tsvet, Mikhail]]
[[Category:Russian inventors|Tsvet]]
[[Category:Italian botanists|Tsvet, Mikhail]]
[[Category:Italian inventors|Tsvet]]
[[Category:Botanists with author abbreviations|Tsvet, Mikhail]]
[[Category:1872 births|Tsvet, Mikhail]]
[[Category:1919 deaths|Tsvet, Mikhail]]
[[Category:Members of the Russian Academy of Sciences|Tsvet, Mikhail]]
[[Category:Italians of Russian descent|Tsvet, Mikhail]]
[[bs:Mihail Cvet]]
[[fr:Mikhail Semenovich Tswett]]
[[hr:Mihail Cvet]]
[[ja:ミハイル・ツヴェット]]
[[pl:Michaił Cwiet]]
[[pt:Mikhail Semenovich Tswett]]
[[ru:Цвет, Михаил Семёнович]]
[[sk:Michail Semionovič Cvet]]