Paul J. Crutzen
| Paul Crutzen | |
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| Born | Paul Jozef Crutzen 3 December 1933 Amsterdam, Netherlands |
| Citizenship | Dutch |
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National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Colorado State University Max Planck Institute for Chemistry |
| Alma mater | University of Stockholm |
| Known for | Research on ozone hole |
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Website www |
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Paul Jozef Crutzen (Dutch pronunciation: [pʌul ˈjoːzəf ˈkrɵtsə(n)]; born 3 December 1933) is a Dutch, Nobel Prize-winning, atmospheric chemist. He is known for work on climate change research and for popularizing the term Anthropocene to describe a proposed new era when human actions have a drastic effect on the Earth.
Crutzen's childhood began just a few years before the start of World War II. In September 1940, the same year Germany invaded The Netherlands, Crutzen entered his first year of elementary school. After many delays and school switches all caused by events in the war, Crutzen graduated from elementary school and moved onto “Hogere Burgerschool” (Higher Citizens School) in 1946, where he became fluent in French, English, and German. Along with languages he also focused on natural sciences in this school, from which he graduated in 1951. After this he entered a Middle Technical School where he studied Civil Engineering. However his schooling would be cut short as he had to serve 21 months of compulsory military service in the Netherlands.
Crutzen has conducted research primary in atmospheric chemistry. He is best known for his research on ozone depletion. In 1970 he pointed out that emissions of nitrous oxide (N2O), a stable, long-lived gas produced by soil bacteria, from the Earth's surface could affect the amount of nitric oxide (NO) in the stratosphere. Crutzen showed that nitrous oxide lives long enough to reach the stratosphere, where it is converted into NO. Crutzen then noted that increasing use of fertilizers might have led to an increase in nitrous oxide emissions over the natural background, which would in turn result in an increase in the amount of NO in the stratosphere. Thus human activity could affect the stratospheric ozone layer. In the following year, Crutzen and (independently) Harold Johnston suggested that NO emissions from the fleet of, then proposed, supersonic transport (SST) airliners(a few hundred Boeing 2707s), which would fly in the lower stratosphere, could also deplete the ozone layer; however more recent analysis has disputed this as a large concern.
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