Herbert Lindlar (1909-2009)

Swiss chemist. He worked for the pharmaceutical company Hoffmann-La Roche, in Basel, on the industrial synthesis of vitamins.

In 1952 he described the Lindlar catalyst: palladium on calcium carbonate, partially deactivated ("poisoned") with lead acetate and quinoline. With it, the hydrogenation of an alkyne stops at the cis alkene, a key step in the synthesis of vitamin A.