Jean-Antoine Chaptal

Who was Jean-Antoine Chaptal?

Jean-Antoine Claude, comte Chaptal de Chanteloup was a French chemist and statesman. He established chemical works for the manufacture of the mineral acids, soda and other substances. In Éléments de Chimie he coined a new word for the gas then known as "azote" or "mephitic air." Chaptal's word was nitrogène, which he named for nitre, the chemical which was needed for the production of nitric acid which had been found to contain the gas, and thus possibly to be the oxidized derivative of it. Chaptal's new term for the gas then quickly passed into English as nitrogen.

As Minister of Internal Affairs, he created the Paris Hospital, health councils, and other bodies.

Chaptal was especially strong in applied science, attempting to apply to industry and agriculture the discoveries of chemistry. In this way, he contributed largely to the development of modern industry. The process of adding sugar to unfermented wine in order to increase the final alcohol level is known as chaptalization after him.