Otto Bayer, whose surname is purely coincidental in relation to the founding family of the Bayer Group, was born on November 4, 1902, in Frankfurt am Main. He began his studies in chemistry in his hometown, completing his doctorate in 1924. His teacher and doctoral advisor was the renowned chemist Julius von Braun, who, after a two-year assistantship, secured his first position in an industrial company, the Cassella dye works of IG Farbenindustrie.
After achieving initial research successes in the field of vat and sulfur dyes and the lightfastness of dyes, Bayer was appointed head of department in 1931. Just two years later, he took another, even more significant career step. He was transferred to Bayer in Leverkusen and promoted to head of the main scientific laboratory. Although Bayer was not yet 32 years old at this time, he managed to make a name for himself as the youngest member of the research team.
In Leverkusen, entirely new fields of research opened up to him, such as rubber chemistry, pharmaceutical research, and crop protection.
Bayer ultimately achieved his greatest successes with the invention of polyurethane chemistry.
The principle of the polyaddition of diisocyanates and polyols originated from Bayer’s research and initially met with considerable skepticism from his closest colleagues. While the production of macromolecular structures was a forward-looking and promising area of research at that time, Bayer’s basic idea of creating hardened foam structures from mixing small amounts of chemical substances was considered unfeasible. After many technical difficulties, Bayer finally succeeded in producing polyurethane foam. It took another 10 years of development before polyurethane chemistry also led to the first raw materials for paints and adhesives.
Otto Bayer was able to influence the development of this versatile family of materials for many years until his death at almost 80 years of age. Thanks to the chemical and entrepreneurial achievements of the polyurethane inventor, the Bayer Group now holds a significant share of the global market in this sector as well.
Leave a Reply