Jons Jacob Berzelius (August 20, 1779 - August 7, 1848) was a Swedish chemist. He worked out the modern technique of chemical formula notation, and is considered a father of modern chemistry. In 1828 he compiled a table of relative atomic weights, where oxygen was set to 100, and included all of the elements known at the time. He developed a system of chemical notation in which the elements were given simple written labels, such as O for oxygen, or Fe for iron, with proportions noted by numbers. Berzelius is credited with identifying the chemical elements silicon, selenium, thorium, and cerium. |