Fritz Haber

Born into a Jewish family in Breslau and later baptized a Christian, Haber solved one of the great chemical problems of his age: fixing inert atmospheric nitrogen into ammonia. Working with high pressure, temperature and metal catalysts, he found a practical synthesis that Carl Bosch scaled to industry, providing the fertilizer that today feeds a large share of humanity. He received the 1918 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for this work; despite his devoted service to Germany, the Nazi regime forced him from his post in 1933 because of his Jewish origins, and he died in exile the following year.