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Vicente Marcano (1848-1891), Polymath Chemist, Discoverer of the Bromelain
Enzyme, and Father of Experimental Science in Venezuela
https://app.box.com/s/698qwejl977hbh9su7i307gq9s14km35
This presentation is 21:26 minutes long. It was delivered, on July, 30, 2021, at the
48
48th
th Symposium of The International Committee for the History of Technology (ICOHTEC)
Symposium of The International Committee for the History of Technology (ICOHTEC)
held conjointly with the
26
26th
th International Congress of the History of Science and Technology (ICHST)
International Congress of the History of Science and Technology (ICHST)
An abstract of it can be read in the next page.
The background on the first slide is a lithograph based on a watercolor, called "View of the City of Caracas", by
the English artist Joseph Thomas. This artwork gives you a view of the city of Caracas at the time when Vicente
Marcano was growing up during the 1850s. Then, Caracas was a city of 34,000 inhabitants.
On this cityscape, you can see the city of Caracas showing a clean and serene atmosphere, with its houses,
courtyards, and churches, her streets following the traditional Spanish street layout, and the magnificent presence
of the great Avila mountain on the north of the city. Even though on this painting life appears peaceful, at that
time Caracas could also be a violent and hostile city.
Vicente Marcano (1848-1891), Polymath Chemist, Discoverer of the Bromelain
Enzyme, and Father of Experimental Science in Venezuela
José Álvarez-Cornett
VES PROJECT and School of Physics, Faculty of Science, Universidad Central de Venezuela
josecornett2000 @marshall.usc.edu
Vicente Marcano, a multidimensional scientist who worked in several disciplines — agricultural and
tropical chemistry, food technology, and geochemistry —, is considered the forefather of experimental
science in Venezuela. Additionally, until the second half of the 20th century, he held the record of
most caves explored in Venezuela. Vicente Marcano also made contributions to anthropology and
ethnography, wrote short stories, promoted the creation of literary associations, and participated in the
political life of Venezuela. He was the Commissioner-General of the Venezuelan delegation to the
Exposition Universelle 1878 in Paris.
Vicente Marcano carried out most of his research in laboratories set up by himself in Venezuela. In the
pineapple juice, he discovered a proteolytic enzyme called Bromelain. In order to receive international
recognition for all his research done in Venezuela, get it published in France, and to have some of his
experiments replicated in Paris, he built a Franco-Alsatian knowledge network (Wurtz-Berthelot-
Duchartre-Schloesing-Naquet-Boussingault-Müntz). He published in Venezuelan magazines and
French academic journals, and obtained several patents of invention related to the discovery of the
Bromelain, which were used by one former associate to start a successful business venture — the
Mosquera-Julia Food Company — in the United States.
This work provides new insights on the education of Vicente Marcano at the École Central of Paris,
describes his Franco-Alsatian knowledge network, and presents the patents of invention he received.
This paper reports the results of the application of the Digital Historical Sounding (DHS) methodology
to a 19th-century case study (previous applications of DHS had been limited to 20th-century cases).
DHS is a methodology created by the author to use the Internet and social networks to make
biographical profiles of scientists, technologists, and scientific institutions. Therefore, all sources used
in this work were digital or came from online elicited information.
Keywords: Vicente Marcano, France, Venezuela, History of Chemistry, Bromelain, Digital Historical Sounding