Victor Moritz Goldschmidt's research, in collaboration with W.C. Brøgger, started when he was in high school, and his first scientific article (Goldschmidt, 1906) was published when he was 18 years old. His biography, written by Mason (1992), is freely available from the Geochemical Society.
One hundred years ago, element 72, hafnium, was named for the latin name of Copenhagen (Hafnia) because Coster & Hevesy (1923) in the research group of Niels Bohr detected the element 29 days before Goldschmidt & Thomassen (1923) in Oslo.
Two blog articles (en/no) describe the detection of hafnium and other neighbouring elements, as well as the geochemical importance of hafnium.
- Centenary for the discovery of element 72 – a Nordic contribution and the utility of hafnium
- Hundreårsjubileum for oppdagelsen av grunnstoff 72 – et nordisk bidrag
The blog articles were published at blog.forskning.no in December 2023 in Reidar G. Trønnes' blogg.
References:
Victor Moritz Goldscmidt: Father of Modern Geochemistry. Geochem. Soc. Spec. Publ. 4, About the hafnium-detection: Chapter 5. Intermezzo: The Search for Element 72.
Coster, D., Hevesy, G., 1923. On the missing element of atomic number 72. Nature 111, 79. Goldschmidt, V.M. 1906 Die Pyrolumineszenz des Quarzes. Forh. Vidensk. Selsk. Kristiania 1906, No. 5
Goldschmidt, V.M., Thomassen, L., 1923. Das Vorkommen des Elements No. 72 (Hafnium) im Malakon und Alvit. Norsk geol. tidsskr. 7, 61-68.