Jim Ottaviani
Jim Ottaviani began writing graphic novels about scientists in 1997 and has never managed to stop. He lives in Michigan and comes to comics via careers in nuclear engineering and librarianship. His next book is Hawking, available July 2019.
Website: www.gt-labs.com
FeatureThe periodic patience of Dmitri Mendeleev
In our final comic of the International Year of the Periodic Table, Mendeleev puts his elemental cards on the table
FeatureLithium: Good enough for batteries
The powerful revolution in your pocket – starring Yoshio Nishi, John Goodenough, Akira Yoshino…and Thomas Edison
FeatureChromium: Lust for colour
Van Gogh’s yellow sunflowers owe a debt to Louis Vaquelin, the chemist who discovered the element chromium
FeatureChlorine, nitrogen and the legacies of Fritz Haber
His ammonia process fed the world – but he also pioneered chemical weapons
FeaturePlutonium: The element factory
Glenn Seaborg’s lab at Berkeley discovered plutonium – an element with uses beyond the deadly one we know well
FeatureP is for phosphorus
A reporter from Alchemistry World reveals the unpleasant secret behind The Alchemist Discovering Phosphorus
FeatureIridium and the demise of the dinosaurs
Geochemical clues from the Cretaceous period reveal the final days of the terrible lizards
FeatureThe end of phlogiston and the discovery of oxygen
Pure air, dephlogisticated air or a new element? Josephy Priestley and Antoine Lavoisier get to grips with new gases in this month’s comic
FeatureThe discovery of the noble gases
How an extra line in the solar spectrum kicked off a search for the ‘missing metals’ that turned out to be noble gases
FeatureThe discovery of graphene
Read how Andre Geim’s Friday night experiments led to the discovery of graphene, a single layer of carbon atoms