Acid Saved Nobel Medals During War

During World War II, Hungarian chemist George de Hevesy protected the Nobel Prize medals of German physicists Max von Laue and James Franck from the Nazis by dissolving them in aqua regia, a mixture of nitric and hydrochloric acids. Because Nazi Germany had forbidden its citizens from accepting Nobel Prizes, possession of the medals could have led to their confiscation. After the war, de Hevesy recovered the gold from the solution, sent it to the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, and the Nobel Foundation recast the medals for their rightful owners.

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