Find Your Formula: Which Influential Chemist Matches Your Scientific Style?

Chemistry has always been shaped by bold thinkers whose curiosity and persistence have changed the way we understand the world, and these legendary figures each had their own unique way of thinking, experimenting, and solving problems.

At ACS Spring 2026, taking place March 22-26 in Atlanta, GA and online, ACS Publications invites you to join us in celebrating the diverse scientific personalities that have shaped the field as we know it today. Stop by the ACS Booth to take our interactive quiz, “Which Influential Chemist Are You?”, and find out which historical scientific icon mirrors your mindset.

We hope to see you there! In the meantime, learn more about each of the featured chemists below and explore how their legacies live on in recent ACS journal articles.

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Alice Ball
Lise Meitner
C.V. Raman
Friedrich Wöhler

Alice Ball: The Applied Problem‑Solver

Alice Ball was trained as a chemist, but her work sat at the intersection of chemistry, medicine, and public health. While working in Hawaiʻi in the 1910s, she developed a chemical modification of chaulmoogra oil that made it injectable and effective against leprosy. Her method became the standard of care worldwide until antibiotics emerged decades later.

Ball’s work reflects a practical approach to chemistry that remains relevant today. Challenges related to solubility, formulation, and patient use continue to shape pharmaceutical research, making Ball’s contribution an early example of chemistry focused on real‑world impact rather than theory alone.

Selected Article Highlights

Alice Ball: An African-American Woman to Foster Education in Chemistry
Stephanie Silva Weigel Gomes and Wilmo Ernesto Francisco Junior*
DOI: 10.1021/acs.jchemed.4c00611

Sustainable Biosynthesis of Diverse Fatty Acid Esters of Hydroxy Fatty Acids (FAHFAs) for Industrial Production
Lay Hiang Ling, Elvis Teng Chua, Bo Xue, Xinying Jia, Jeng Yeong Chow, Ren Liang Yang, Yan Ping Lim, Ping Han, Hao Xie, Choon-Hong Tan, Giang Kien Truc Nguyen, and Wen Shan Yew*
DOI: 10.1021/acssuschemeng.4c08793

Biosensor-Based Platforms for the Detection and Screening of Mycobacterium leprae Infection
Augusto César Parreiras de Jesus*, Ana Laura Grossi de Oliveira, Flavia Di Scala, Cristiane Alves da Silva Menezes, Lilian Lacerda Bueno, Bart van Grinsven, Rocio Arreguin-Campos, Ricardo Toshio Fujiwara, and Thomas J. Cleij
https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acsinfecdis.5c00851

Lise Meitner: The Collaborative Theorist

Lise Meitner played a central role in explaining the process of nuclear fission, co-authoring the theoretical framework that described how atomic nuclei could split and release vast amounts of energy. Working with her nephew Otto Frisch, she interpreted experimental results from Otto Hahn and Fritz Strassmann—work that would later underpin nuclear power and medicine.

Meitner’s approach was deeply collaborative and interdisciplinary, bridging physics and chemistry at a time when both fields were rapidly evolving. Though she was overlooked for the Nobel Prize, her contributions are now widely recognized, including through recent honors such as the ACS Division of the History of Chemistry (HIST) 2023 Citation for Chemical Breakthrough Award.

Selected Article Highlights

Ultralow Thermal Conductivity and Excellent Gamma-Radiation Resistance of a Novel Boron-Doped Silica Aerogel for Thermal Protection in Nuclear Applications
Lixia Yang*, Jingyi Xie, Qiong Wu, Zhaofeng Chen*, Shijie Chen, Longpan Yin, Xingyu Wang, Bin Hou, Huanjun Zhu, and Sheng Cui
DOI: 10.1021/acssuschemeng.4c10529

Engineering Programmable Electroactive Living Materials for Highly Efficient Uranium Capture and Accumulation
Feng-He Li, Zi-Han Liang, Hong Sun, Qiang Tang*, and Han-Qing Yu*
DOI: 10.1021/acs.est.4c07276

Ultrafast Photoassisted Capture of Uranium over Cu₂O/CuO Heterojunction Enabled by Rapid Interfacial Electron Transfer
Huanhuan Liu, Hongliang Guo, Dingping Huang, Li Zhou, Jia Lei*, Yan Liu*, and Wenkun Zhu*
DOI: 10.1021/acsmaterialslett.4c02121

C.V. Raman: The Spectral Explorer

C.V. Raman’s discovery of inelastic light scattering—now known as the Raman Effect—opened a new window into the molecular world. His work showed that light could interact with matter in ways that revealed vibrational energy levels, giving chemists a powerful tool to identify and study substances without altering them.

Raman’s approach was rooted in curiosity about the natural world, but his discovery became foundational to analytical chemistry, materials science, and biomedical imaging. His legacy is honored annually in India on National Science Day, a celebration of scientific progress held on the anniversary of his discovery of the Raman Effect. Today, Raman spectroscopy is used to probe everything from pollutants in water to protein folding in cells.

Selected Article Highlights

Probing Photocatalytic Reduction Pathways of CO₂ by Catalyst PbBiO₂Br Using In-Situ Raman Spectroscopy
Kang-Yu Hsiao, Fu-Yu Liu, Chiing-Chang Chen*, and I-Chia Chen*
DOI: 10.1021/acscatal.4c06401

Breath Analysis via Surface Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy
Adrián Fernández-Lodeiro, Marios Constantinou, Christoforos Panteli, Agapios Agapiou, and Chrysafis Andreou*
DOI: 10.1021/acssensors.4c02685

Unveiling the Molecular Secrets: A Comprehensive Review of Raman Spectroscopy in Biological Research
Anshuman Chandra, Vimal Kumar, Umesh Chandra Garnaik, Rima Dada, Imteyaz Qamar, Vijay Kumar Goel, and Shilpi Agarwal*
DOI: 10.1021/acsomega.4c00591

Friedrich Wöhler: The Boundary Breaker

Friedrich Wöhler is best known for a single experiment that changed how chemists understood life and matter. In 1828, he synthesized urea, an organic compound associated with living systems, from inorganic starting materials. At the time, this result challenged the widely held belief that organic substances could only be produced by living organisms, a concept known as vitalism. Wöhler’s work showed that the same chemical rules applied to both living and nonliving matter.

That insight helped establish organic chemistry as a discipline grounded in laboratory synthesis rather than biological origin. Today, the ability to design and build complex molecules rests on the same principle his work helped make clear: chemistry operates according to universal laws, regardless of context.

Selected Article Highlights

Achieving Record-Breaking Urea Synthesis on Crystalline–Amorphous Hybrid via Electrochemical-Chemical Looping
Zhong Cheng, Xiaodeng Wang, Dafeng Yan, Xupeng Qin, Dawei Chen, Chu Zhang, Yujie Wang, Yansong Zhou, Chade Lv, Peilian Hou, Kefan Zhang, Peng Jin, Yangyang Zhou, Qinghua Liu, Kaizhi Gu, Xiaoxiao Wei, Chen Chen*, and Shuangyin Wang*
DOI: 10.1021/jacs.5c13721

Theory-Guide Design of Integrative Catalytic Pairs for Urea Synthesis from Nitrate and Carbon Dioxide
Qiwen Su, Shucheng Yang, Shiyao Shang, Song Liu*, Dongxu Jiao, Yuwei Yan, Xueshi Song, Ke Chu*, and Jingxiang Zhao*
DOI: 10.1021/acsnano.5c01909

Electrode–Electrolyte Engineering and In Situ Spectroscopy for Urea Electrosynthesis from Carbon Dioxide and Nitrate Co-Reduction
Gabriel F. Costa and María Escudero-Escribano*
DOI: 10.1021/jacsau.5c00065