Joseph-Louis Proust Project

1. JOSEPH-LOUIS PROUSTJOSEPH-LOUIS PROUST
Anna Chapman
Garland – Allen
12 April 2010

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3. Growing UpGrowing Up
Joseph Louis Proust was born on
September 26, 1754 in
Angers, France. His father
was an apothecary and from a
young age, Proust studied
chemistry in his father’s shop.
He started preparing to be an
apothecary like his father and
brother, Joachim.

4. In 1774, the year Proust turned 20, he decided to leave for
Paris against his family’s wishes. By 1776, Proust was
appointed apothecary in chief of the world-renowned Pitié-
Salpêtrière Hospital, one of the largest teaching hospitals in
Europe.
Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital

5. In 1778, Proust left Paris for Spain, to
be a chemistry professor. He
taught many places, like the
University of Salamanca, and
studied chemistry in a lab provided
for him by Charles IV of Spain.
In 1808, Napoleon invaded Spain and
French soldiers ruined Proust’s
laboratory. He returned to France
as a poor man.
Napoleon BonaparteNapoleon Bonaparte

6. On June 23, 1784 Proust accompanied Jean-François Pilâtre
de Rozier in one of the first hot air balloon ascents in the
presence of the royal court. They set new records for
distance traveled, speed, and altitude.

7. Law of Definite Law of Definite
ProportionsProportions
I shall conclude by deducing from these experiments
the principle I have established at the commencement of
this memoir, viz. that iron like many other metals is
subject to the law of nature which presides at every true
combination, that is to say, that it unites with two constant
proportions of oxygen. In this respect it does not differ
from tin, mercury, and lead, and, in a word, almost every
known combustible.
“
”
Proust made statements like this one, regarding several of his experiments.
He later proposed that a chemical compound always contains exactly the
same proportion of elements by mass, completely contradicting the
thoughts of Claude Louis Berthollet, another French scientist. The dispute
between the two finally ended, when at last, Berthollet agreed that Proust
was correct.

8. Proust impacted our lives and the lives of others in Proust impacted our lives and the lives of others in
various ways.various ways.
•While he was in Spain, he was the first to identify the sugar in grapes
as glucose.
•Proust helped develop one of the first hot air balloons, paving the way
for future aeronautic experiments.
•His law of definite proportions has helped scientists everywhere, and
without it, we may not have the knowledge of compounds that we do
today.
•That same law of definite proportions was studied and rephrased by
John Dalton, who called it the law of multiple proportions, and used it
as evidence for his atomic theory- the first factual scientific theory of
the atom.

9. History 1750-1830History 1750-1830
17891789 – French Revolution began.
17921792 – France proclaims a republic.
1793 1793 January 21 – King Louis XVI was executed.
1793 1793 June 27 – Reign of Terror began.
17941794 July 27 – Reign of Terror ended.
1795 1795 November 2 - Executive Directory took power in France.
17991799 – France was taken over by the Consulate.
18041804 – Start of the Napoleonic Empire (First French Empire).
* The Reign of Terror was a period a violence provoked by a conflict
between the Girondins and the Jacobins, which were rival political
parties.
* The Executive Directory was an organization of five directors who held
executive power in France.
* A period where Napoleon Bonaparte was First Consul, the leader of a
conservative, centralized government in France, without declaring himself
head of state.
* Empire of Napoleon I, a dominant power in most of Europe in the beginning
of the 19
th
century.

10. BibliographyBibliography
Document sans nom. (n.d.). Serveur des laboratoires de l'UPMC. Retrieved April 10,
2010, from http://www.labos.upmc.fr/center-meg/
"Joseph Louis Proust." The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition. 2008. Retrieved April
11, 2010 from Encyclopedia.com:
http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1E1-Proust-J.html
Joseph-Louis Proust Biography | World of Scientific Discovery Biography. (n.d.).
BookRags.com: Book Summaries, Study Guides. Retrieved April 11, 2010, from
http://www.bookrags.com/biography/joseph-louis-proust-wsd/
Proust, Louis Joseph . (n.d.). Online 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved April 11,
2010, from http://encyclopedia.jrank.org/articles/pages/7546/Proust-Louis-
Joseph.html
Seymour H., M. (2010). Proust, Joseph-Louis. Britannica Biographies, 1. Retrieved from
History Reference Center database.
Vidya, R. (n.d.). WORLD OF SCIENCE: October 2008. WORLD OF SCIENCE . Retrieved
April 11, 2010, from http://sciencemagics.blogspot.com/2008_10_01_archive.html

Waterloo: Napoleon’s Last Battle « Scott’s Blog. (n.d.). Scott’s Blog. Retrieved April 11,
2010, from http://amazingscott.wordpress.com/2008/06/30/waterloo-napoleons-last-
battle/