Anton Köllisch

Anton Köllisch (1888–1916) was the German chemist who, whilst working at Darmstadt for pharmaceutical giant Merck, first synthesized the chemical MDMA that would later come to be known as "ecstasy".

A patent was filed for the drug on Christmas Eve 1912, and was granted on May 16, 1914. Köllisch, however, died as a soldier in World War I in September 1916 with no idea of the impact his synthesis would have.

References

• Germany, Kaiserliches Patentamt, Patentschrift Nr 274350, http://mdma.net/merck/mdma-patent1.html
• Benzenhöfer, U, and Passie, T. (2006). The early history of Ecstasy. Nervenarzt 77, 95-99. (German) PMID 16397805.
• Adam, David. Truth about ecstasy's unlikely trip from lab to dance floor: Pharmaceutical company unravels drug's chequered past, Guardian Unlimited, 2006-08-18.
• R. W. Freudenmann u. a.: The origin of MDMA (ecstasy) revisited: the true story reconstructed from the original documents. (PDF-Datei; 182 kB) In: Addiction 101, 2006, S. 1241–1245. doi:10.1111/j.1360-0443.2006.01511.x PMID 16911722