A History of Research and a Review of Recent Developments
A History of Research and a Review of Recent Developments
A History of Research and a Review of Recent Developments
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The development <strong>of</strong> low <strong>and</strong> high explosives 3<br />
celebrated chemist <strong>of</strong> medieval times, a skilled experimentalist <strong>and</strong> a developer<br />
<strong>of</strong> theories with their roots in Greek science <strong>and</strong> occult philosophy. Almost a<br />
thous<strong>and</strong> years later the production <strong>of</strong> nitric acid had changed to a process<br />
invented by the German chemist Johann Rudolf Glauber, who was born at<br />
Karlstadt in Bavaria. He eventually settled in Holl<strong>and</strong> <strong>and</strong> built a magnificent<br />
laboratory in Amsterdam in the mid-seventeenth century where among other<br />
things he defined the medicinal properties <strong>of</strong> Glauber’s salt. His process for<br />
nitric acid was to heat a nitrate with concentrated sulphuric acid, but nowadays<br />
there are several commercial processes, the most common <strong>of</strong> which use the<br />
catalytic oxidation <strong>of</strong> ammonia. Nitric acid is very powerful <strong>and</strong> has formed<br />
the basis <strong>of</strong> most modern explosives. In 1838 T.J.Pelouze discovered that cotton<br />
could be converted into an extremely inflammable substance by the action <strong>of</strong><br />
concentrated nitric acid, <strong>and</strong> in 1845 it was shown by C.F.Schönbein that this<br />
substance could be made into an explosive by adding sulphuric acid to the<br />
nitric acid. Nitrocellulose was introduced as an ingredient <strong>of</strong> gunpowder in<br />
the 1860s, <strong>and</strong> when E.A.Brown discovered in 1868 that nitrocellulose could<br />
be exploded by a detonator the substance began to be used as a high explosive.<br />
It is an unstable material, however, <strong>and</strong> stabilizers need to be added to convert<br />
the substance into the more reliable explosive known as Guncotton. This is a<br />
white, inodorous, tasteless solid that retains the structure <strong>of</strong> the cotton.<br />
A much more far-reaching development based on nitric acid was the discovery<br />
in 1846 by the Italian scientist A.Sobrero <strong>of</strong> nitroglycerine, made by the<br />
treatment <strong>of</strong> glycerine with a mixture <strong>of</strong> concentrated nitric <strong>and</strong> sulphuric<br />
acids. It was the study <strong>of</strong> nitroglycerine that introduced the name <strong>of</strong> Nobel,<br />
first to the explosives industry, then to oil production, <strong>and</strong> then to the world<br />
via the Nobel foundation <strong>and</strong> its prizes. Alfred Bernhard Nobel, engineer <strong>and</strong><br />
chemist, was born in Stockholm in 1833, <strong>and</strong> by 1867 he had combined<br />
nitroglycerine with a diatomaceous earth, known as kieselguhr (kiesel is gravel,<br />
hence Chesil beach in Dorset), to form dynamite. This made the commercial<br />
use <strong>of</strong> nitroglycerine possible <strong>and</strong> was an invention <strong>of</strong> great importance. The<br />
patenting <strong>of</strong> Guhr dynamite, as it was called, in Britain <strong>and</strong> the USA was<br />
followed by a number <strong>of</strong> other dynamites in which nitroglycerine was mixed<br />
with other substances capable <strong>of</strong> sustaining an explosion. These included sodium<br />
nitrate, wood pulp, calcium carbonate <strong>and</strong> charcoal. In 1876 Nobel patented<br />
blasting gelatin, which was the most powerful <strong>and</strong> shattering explosive <strong>of</strong> its<br />
time, made by dissolving 7% <strong>of</strong> collodion nitrocellulose in nitroglycerine. In<br />
1889, a few years before his death in 1896, Nobel produced ballistite, a<br />
nitroglycerine smokeless powder which was the forerunner <strong>of</strong> cordite.<br />
Of equal importance to his work on dynamite, Nobel also constructed the<br />
fulminate <strong>of</strong> mercury detonator for initiating the explosion <strong>of</strong> nitroglycerine<br />
<strong>and</strong> guncotton. Fulminate <strong>of</strong> mercury became known as an initiating or primary<br />
explosive, because it could easily be detonated by impact, <strong>and</strong> could therefore<br />
change ignition into detonation by shock rather than heat. These developments,<br />
together with exploitation <strong>of</strong> the Baku oilfields, brought Alfred Nobel a fortune,