Lanxess Gearing Up for World Rubber Day
One hundred years ago, the chemist Fritz Hofmann invented the first ever synthetic rubber. After beavering away with his assistant Carl Coutelle and a research team in their employer’s laboratory in Elberfeld, western Germany, Hofmann produced the flexible substance methyl-isoprene, and in doing so laid the cornerstone for the development of a viable alternative to natural rubber. To honour this invention, Lanxess has established “World Rubber Day”, an occasion that will be celebrated for the first time on September 12, 2009.