Making logical connections

摘要

Why did you decide to become a chemist?rnWe lived on a farm in Scotland. Once, my mother came down with flu and my father was away. I decided to make my mother a cup of tea. I had only a tenuous grasp of proportions and the resulting brew was close to one part water to 10 parts tea leaves. She drank it nonetheless. Thus encouraged, I starting mixing anything I could find on the farm to see what would happen. By age 14, I had my own laboratory at home. After completing a synthesis of benzidine (nowadays firmly banned as being far too toxic) and reading a textbook on valence theory, the future course of my professional life was firmly set.