![Observations on Different Kinds of Air [Priestley]. WITH: Experiments Upon Vegetables, Discovering Their Great Power of Purifying the Common Air in the Sun-Shine [IngenHousz]](https://gcp-la8-storage-cdn.lot-art.com/public/upl/54/Observations-on-Different-Kinds-of-Air-Priestley-WITH-Experiments-Upon-Vegetables-Discovering-Their-Great-Power-of-Purifying-_1599752192_7643.jpg "Observations on Different Kinds of Air [Priestley]. WITH: Experiments Upon Vegetables, Discovering Their Great Power of Purifying the Common Air in the Sun-Shine [IngenHousz]")
Observations on Different Kinds of Air [Priestley]. WITH: Experiments Upon Vegetables, Discovering Their Great Power of Purifying the Common Air in the Sun-Shine [IngenHousz]
By PRIESTLEY, JOSEPH; INGENHOUSZ, JAN
FIRST EDITIONS OF TWO MILESTONES IN THE DISCOVERY OF PHOTOSYNTHESIS; OUTSTANDING COPIES. Since ancient times naturalists have noted the peculiar powers of green plants. A small seed grows in size and mass over the years and eventually becomes an enormous tree, but without any apparent intake of food. The natural, and early, assumption was that plants were, in effect, extracting nutrition from the soil in which they grow, but in a famous seventeenth-century experiment, Jan Baptist von Helmont planted a five-pound willow stem in a pot of soil. Over the course of five years the sprig grew into a 169-pound tree, while the weight of the soil in which it had been planted decreased by only two ounces. Von Helmont assumed that the missing mass came from water - the only other apparent source of raw material available to his willow. Later scientists guessed correctly that plants lost a significant part of their water intake through evaporation, and that atmospheric gases must somehow also play a role in a plant's creation of its own substance. Today, of course, we know that through a process called photosynthesis, green plants can use water and carbon dioxide as raw materials, and light as an energy source, to manufacture biomass in the form of carbohydrates, discarding oxygen into the atmosphere as a waste product. As Updike points out, this mechanism interlocks elegantly with its biochemical mirror image - respiration - the process by which all organisms, plants as well as animals, break down carbohydrate in order to generate energy in a form that can be used by the organism, consuming oxygen in the process and creating carbon dioxide as a waste product. Photosynthesis, by reversing the effects of respiration, is essential to the long-term viability of life on earth. Some two and a half centuries of research has elucidated the mechanisms of photosynthesis, and revealed a beautiful and complex chain of reactions - a "gigantic ladder, forged by light," in Updike's words - by which chlorophyll in plant cells captures energy from incident sunlight and uses it to create carbohydrate from carbon dioxide. (See, for example, Robert E. Blankenship, Molecular Mechanisms of Photosynthesis (2d ed. 2014).) The two papers offered here document two early and critical milestones in that history - Joseph Priestley's seminal discovery that green plants can somehow revive the air in a sealed container in which combustion or respiration has taken place, and once again enable it support life (by, we would now say, consuming carbon dioxide and generating oxygen); and Jan IngenHousz's more detailed study of the phenomenon, which revealed, among other things, that this action of green plants takes place only in the presence of light. Both of these great scientists were prepared for their work in photosynthesis by wide-ranging interests and studies, contact with key Enlightenment scholars, and careful attention to experimental technique. Priestley: After a period of early interest and work in philosophy, theology, language, and aesthetics, "Priestley was ordained and obtained an LL.D. from the University of Edinburgh (1764) . There he also began his scientific career, with the writing of his History of Electricity for which he enlisted the support of Benjamin Franklin [and others], whom he met in London late in 1765. At their suggestion - before the History was published but after some of his experiments were known privately to sponsors - he was nominated and elected F.R.S. [Fellow of the Royal Society] in 1766. . Early in 1767, because of growing family responsibilities and the perennial financial and sectarian problems of Warrington [an academy at which he held a teaching position], Priestley resigned . to become minister of Mill-Hill Chapel, a major Presbyterian congregation in Leeds. The History of Electricity (1767) and History of Optics (1772) were published while he was at Leeds, and there he began his most famous scientific researches, those into the
Published by: Lockyer Davis, printer to the Royal Society; AND: P. Elmsly and H. Payne, London, 1772
Vendor: Manhattan Rare Book Company, ABAA, ILAB
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By PRIESTLEY, JOSEPH; INGENHOUSZ, JAN
FIRST EDITIONS OF TWO MILESTONES IN THE DISCOVERY OF PHOTOSYNTHESIS; OUTSTANDING COPIES. Since ancient times naturalists have noted the peculiar powers of green plants. A small seed grows in size and mass over the years and eventually becomes an enormous tree, but without any apparent intake of food. The natural, and early, assumption was that plants were, in effect, extracting nutrition from the soil in which they grow, but in a famous seventeenth-century experiment, Jan Baptist von Helmont planted a five-pound willow stem in a pot of soil. Over the course of five years the sprig grew into a 169-pound tree, while the weight of the soil in which it had been planted decreased by only two ounces. Von Helmont assumed that the missing mass came from water - the only other apparent source of raw material available to his willow. Later scientists guessed correctly that plants lost a significant part of their water intake through evaporation, and that atmospheric gases must somehow also play a role in a plant's creation of its own substance. Today, of course, we know that through a process called photosynthesis, green plants can use water and carbon dioxide as raw materials, and light as an energy source, to manufacture biomass in the form of carbohydrates, discarding oxygen into the atmosphere as a waste product. As Updike points out, this mechanism interlocks elegantly with its biochemical mirror image - respiration - the process by which all organisms, plants as well as animals, break down carbohydrate in order to generate energy in a form that can be used by the organism, consuming oxygen in the process and creating carbon dioxide as a waste product. Photosynthesis, by reversing the effects of respiration, is essential to the long-term viability of life on earth. Some two and a half centuries of research has elucidated the mechanisms of photosynthesis, and revealed a beautiful and complex chain of reactions - a "gigantic ladder, forged by light," in Updike's words - by which chlorophyll in plant cells captures energy from incident sunlight and uses it to create carbohydrate from carbon dioxide. (See, for example, Robert E. Blankenship, Molecular Mechanisms of Photosynthesis (2d ed. 2014).) The two papers offered here document two early and critical milestones in that history - Joseph Priestley's seminal discovery that green plants can somehow revive the air in a sealed container in which combustion or respiration has taken place, and once again enable it support life (by, we would now say, consuming carbon dioxide and generating oxygen); and Jan IngenHousz's more detailed study of the phenomenon, which revealed, among other things, that this action of green plants takes place only in the presence of light. Both of these great scientists were prepared for their work in photosynthesis by wide-ranging interests and studies, contact with key Enlightenment scholars, and careful attention to experimental technique. Priestley: After a period of early interest and work in philosophy, theology, language, and aesthetics, "Priestley was ordained and obtained an LL.D. from the University of Edinburgh (1764) . There he also began his scientific career, with the writing of his History of Electricity for which he enlisted the support of Benjamin Franklin [and others], whom he met in London late in 1765. At their suggestion - before the History was published but after some of his experiments were known privately to sponsors - he was nominated and elected F.R.S. [Fellow of the Royal Society] in 1766. . Early in 1767, because of growing family responsibilities and the perennial financial and sectarian problems of Warrington [an academy at which he held a teaching position], Priestley resigned . to become minister of Mill-Hill Chapel, a major Presbyterian congregation in Leeds. The History of Electricity (1767) and History of Optics (1772) were published while he was at Leeds, and there he began his most famous scientific researches, those into the
Published by: Lockyer Davis, printer to the Royal Society; AND: P. Elmsly and H. Payne, London, 1772
Vendor: Manhattan Rare Book Company, ABAA, ILAB
