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his father was a local school teacher whose career was ended by blindness and o support his family his mother ran a glass factory. Mendeleev learned some science from a political refugee who married one of his sisters. His father died in 1847, and soon after his mothers factory was destroyed by fire. She left Tobolsk with Mendeleev, she was determined that her last son should receive a good education. He studied chemistry at the University of Saint Petersburg, and in 1859 he was sent to study at the University of Heidelberg. There he met the Italian chemist Stanislao Cannizzaro, whose views on atomic weight influenced his thinking.
Mendeleev returned to Saint Petersburg and became professor of chemistry at the Technical Institute in 1863. He became professor of general chemistry at the University of Saint Petersburg in 1866. Mendeleev was a renowned teacher, and, because no good textbook in chemistry was available, he wrote the two-volume Principles of Chemistry. He wrote them in-between 1868-1870. They became a classic. Mendeleev became best known for his development of the periodic law of the properties.
In Saint Petersburg, Mendeleev investigated the periodic law, the composition of solutions, and the nature and origin of petroleum. His first periodic table was developed in 1871. His new finds led him to believe that three previously unknown elements existed. He assigned these elements and their compounds specific structures, terming them boron, eka-aluminum, eka-silicon. Chemist took an interest in his findings when they were confirmed within fifteen years.
During the writing of this book, Mendeleyev tried to classify the elements according to their chemical properties. In 1869 he published his first version of what became known as the periodic table, in which he demonstrated the periodic law. In 1871 he published an improved version of the periodic table, in which he left gaps for elements that were not yet known. His chart and theories gained increased acceptance when three predicted elements were discovered.
The three elements were gallium, germanium, and scandium. Mendeleev is remembered as a brilliant scholar, an inspiring teacher, and a prolific writer. Besides his career in chemistry, he was interested in art, education, and economics. A man who was not afraid to express his strong opinions, even when they might offend others, he was apparently bypassed for a few academic appointments and honors because of his irritable nature.
Nonetheless, his development of the periodic table of elements made his reputation in the science community solid.
