Marceli Nencki

Wilhelm Marceli Nencki (15 January 1847 in Boczki, Zduńska Wola County – 14 October 1901 in Saint Petersburg) was a famous Polish chemist and doctor.

Nencki's main scientific interest concentrated on urea synthesis, the chemistry of purines and biological oxidation of aromatic compounds. He was also interested in the structure of proteins, enzymatic processes in the intestine and bacterial biochemistry. One of his achievements was for example demonstration that urea is formed in the organism from amino acids rather than being preformed on a protein molecule and that it is accompanied by binding of carbon dioxide.

He proposed that the synthesis of fatty acids proceeds stepwise, by a gradual condensation of two-carbon-atom fragments and that oxidation of fatty acids occurs by splitting into two-carbon units.

In 1877 while working at the University of Berne he discovered rhodanine via a reaction between ammonium rhodanide (in modern chemistry ammonium thiocyanate) and chloroacetic acid in water.

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