William Joseph Wiswesser
William Joseph Wiswesser (1914-1989) was an American chemist.
Life
William Joseph Wiswesser was born on December 3, 1914 in Reading, Pennsylvania. He graduated from Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, with a BS degree in chemistry in 1936. He worked as a Research chemist, at the Hercules Powder Co. 1936-39; then as Assistant research director, at the Trojan Powder Co. 1939-42. Wiswesser was an instructor of chemistry in the Cooper Union's School of Engineering, 1942-45; Head of department of chemical research, Ray-O-Vac 1945-63; and Research chemist, US Army, Fort Detrich from 1963.
Wiswesser worked for Willson Products, where he was Director of Industrial Hygiene, followed by civilian employment by the U.S. Army at Fort Detrick and finally at the Agricultural Research Service of the USDA. He died on Decemeber 17, 1989 in Reading, Pennsylvania.
Contributions
In 1945, he published his paper describing a formula that correctly orders the subshells of atomic orbitals in the manner of the Aufbau principle, also known as the Wiswesser rule.[1]
In 1949, Wiswesser first presented what is now known as the Wiswesser line notation [2], which was particularly well suited to molecular structure representation within the computing platforms and modalities available. This work, which was further developed and expanded on by him for many years, had a lasting impact on the field of chemical informatics. It was adopted by the Institute for Scientific Information and many pharmaceutical companies
Offices
Wiswesser was editor of Chemical World Index Key News and etablished the Chemical Notation Association.
Awards
- American Chemical Society. Skolnik Award, 1980.
Further reading
- "William Wiswesser" Wikipedia [3]
- Gelberg, Alan, "William Joseph Wiswesser 1914 – 1989," Journal of Chemical Information and Computer Sciences 30, no 1 (1990): 1. Obituary [4]
Papers
Lehigh University Libraries, Mart Science and Engineering Library, Bethlehem, PA. * Finding aid:
- Source: Subject Collections, 7th ed. Volume 2 M-Z