New Delhi: On Wednesday, search engine giant Google is celebrating the legacy of Czech chemist Otto Wichterle. Today on his 108th birth anniversary, Google paid tribute to the legendary with a doodle. Wichterle’s invention of soft contact lens changed the lives of millions of people around the globe. Over 140 million people in the world wear contact lenses today.
Here’s what you should know about Otto Wichterle:
# Wichterle was born on this day in 1913 in Prostĕjov, the Czech Republic (then, Austria-Hungary).
# Otto Wichterle was awestruck by science from the days of his youth, and hence went on to earn his doctorate in organic chemistry in 1936 from the Prague Institute of Chemical Technology (ICT).
# He taught as a professor at his alma mater during the 1950s while developing an absorbent and transparent gel for eye implants.
# However, due to political turmoil he was pushed out of the the ICT, though he continued refining his hydrogel development at home.
# In 1961, Wichterle – who also wore glasses – produced the first soft contact lenses with a DIY apparatus made of a child’s erector set, a bicycle light battery, a phonograph motor, and homemade glass tubing and molds.
# According to a Google blog post, Wichterle – as the inventor of countless patents and a lifelong researcher – was elected the first President of the Academy of the Czech Republic following the country’s establishment in 1993.
“Happy birthday, Otto Wichterle—thanks for helping the world see eye to eye!,” Google wrote in its blogpost.
