Jacopo Bartolomeo Beccari
Jacopo Bartolomeo Beccari was an Italian chemist, one of the leading scientists in Bologna in the first half of the eighteenth century. He is mainly known as the discoverer of the gluten in wheat flour. Beccari was the first to give courses in chemistry at an Italian university. He is considered a forerunner of food science and bromatological chemistry.
Life
Early life and education
Jacopo Bartolomeo Beccari was born in Bologna on 25 July 1682. After attending the Jesuit College, he graduated Doctor of Philosophy and Medicine at the University of Bologna in 1704. That same year he became member of the Accademia degli Inquieti created by Eustachio Manfredi in 1690. In 1712, he was appointed Professor of Theoretical Medicine at the University of Bologna.Career
At the end of 1711, Luigi Ferdinando Marsili established the Institute and Academy of Sciences of the Institute of Bologna. Beccari was named head of the Natural Sciences Department and chair of Experimental Physics.In 1724, Beccari was elected President of the Academy of Sciences of Bologna, a position took also in 1735, 1740 and 1750. In 1728, he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society. In 1737, he was named Professor of Chemistry at the University of Bologna. One of his disciples was Luigi Galvani.
After 40 years of teaching, in 1749, Beccari was named Emeritus Professor. He died in Bologna on 18 January 1766, and was buried in the Sanctuary of the Madonna del Baraccano.
Scientific work
Besides teaching, he carried out a wide scientific activity, mainly in disciplines related to medicine, such as physiology, pathology and food science. He carried out important research on the phosphorescence of bodies, and studied the measurement of the intensity of the light emitted. In 1745, he discovered that silver salts are photosensitive, undergoing color change on exposure to light.From his comments on foraminifera he is considered as one of the pioneers of microbiology. Beccari was also the first scientist to have ever described a microfossil species. His papers on fossil foraminifera provide evidence for the first micropaleontological analyses, including a deep investigation of the dominant species of the assemblage, and also a rigorous approach to the description of the materials, methods and interpretation.
Beccari is best known for the discovery of the gluten in wheat flour. In his article De frumento, published in the Transactions of the Academy of Bologna in 1745, Beccari described the separation of flour into two components, "amylaceum", which was soluble in water and had properties similar to those of sugars, and "glutinosum," which was insoluble and sticky and resembled substances of animal origin.
Beccari also performed studies in other fields, such as hydrology, meteorology and physics. In recognition of his pioneering studies on micropaleontology, Linnaeus dedicated the most common and widespread species of his microscopic Nautilus to him.