Francis Otto Matthiessen (February 19, 1902 – April 1, 1950) was an educator, scholar and literary critic influential in the fields of American literature and American studies. His best known work, American Renaissance: Art and Expression in the Age of Emerson and Whitman, celebrated the achievements of several 19th-century American authors and had a profound impact on a generation of scholars. Matthiessen was well known for his support of liberal causes and progressive politics. His contributions to the Harvard University community have been memorialized in several ways, including a recently endowed visiting professorship.
Matthiessen was born in Pasadena, California on February 19, 1902. He was the fourth of four children born to Frederick William Matthiessen (1868-1948) and Lucy Orne Pratt (1866). The family's three older siblings included Frederick William (1894), George Dwight (1897) and Lucy Orne (1898).
In Pasadena Matthiessen was a student at Polytechnic School. Following the separation of his parents, he relocated with his mother to his paternal grandparents home in La Salle, Illinois. His grandfather, Frederick William Matthiessen, was an industrial leader in zinc production and a successful manufacturer of clocks and machine tools. Also, he served as mayor of La Salle for ten years. The grandson completed his secondary education at Hackley School, in Tarrytown, New York.
Fo or FO may refer to:
Apúlia e Fão is a civil parish in the municipality of Esposende, Portugal. It was formed in 2013 by the merger of the former parishes Apúlia and Fão. The population in 2011 was 7,301, in an area of 16.29 km².
Dioxygen difluoride is a compound of fluorine and oxygen with the molecular formula O
2F
2. It exists as an orange solid that melts into a red liquid at −163 °C (110 K). It is an extremely strong oxidant and decomposes into oxygen and fluorine even at −160 °C (113 K) at a rate of 4% per day: its lifetime at room temperature is thus extremely short. Dioxygen difluoride reacts with nearly every chemical it encounters – even ordinary ice – leading to its onomatopoeic nickname "FOOF" (a play on its chemical structure).
The material has no practical applications, but has been of theoretical interest. One laboratory's use of it was the synthesis of plutonium hexafluoride at unprecedentedly low temperatures, which was significant because previous methods for its preparation needed temperatures so high that the plutonium hexafluoride created would rapidly decompose.
Dioxygen difluoride can be obtained by subjecting a 1:1 mixture of gaseous fluorine and oxygen at low pressure (7–17 mmHg is optimal) to an electric discharge of 25–30 mA at 2.1–2.4 kV.
A similar method was used for the first synthesis by Otto Ruff in 1933. Another synthesis involves mixing O
2 and F
2 in a stainless steel vessel cooled to −196 °C (77.1 K), followed by exposing the elements to 6987480652946100000♠3 MeV bremsstrahlung for several hours. A third method requires heating a mix of fluorine and oxygen to 700 °C (1,292 °F), and then rapidly cooling it using liquid oxygen. All of these methods involve synthesis according to the equation: