Fritz Haber

Fritz Haber (1868-1934), German chemist and Nobel laureate, best known for his development of an economical method of ammonia synthesis. Haber was born in Breslau (now Wrocław, Poland) and educated at the Technische Hochschule in Berlin. He was appointed professor of physical chemistry at the University of Berlin in 1911. Subsequently he became director of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Physical Chemistry in Berlin. During World War I Haber was chief of the German chemical warfare service and he directed the chlorine gas attack at the Second Battle of Ypres. In 1933, because of anti-Semitic policies in Germany, Haber resigned and went to Switzerland, where he died the following year.

Haber's greatest achievement was his discovery in 1913 of a process for synthesizing ammonia by the direct combination of nitrogen and hydrogen (see Nitrogen Fixation). The method was adapted to commercial use in the 1930s by the German chemist Karl Bosch. The Haber-Bosch process is used in the manufacture of explosives and in the production of fertilizers. Haber also made fundamental contributions to the field of electrochemistry. He was awarded the 1918 Nobel Prize in chemistry.