Michael Freemantle

Michael Freemantle is a science writer. His latest book, The Chemists' War: 1914 - 1918, was published by the Royal Society of Chemistry in September 2014. His previous book, Gas! GAS! Quick, boys! How Chemistry Changed the First World War, (The History Press) appeared in paperback in 2013. Freemantle is also the author of An Introduction to Ionic Liquids.

Freemantle was Information Officer for IUPAC (International Union of Pure & Applied Chemistry) from 1985 to 1994. His duties included editing the IUPAC news magazine Chemistry International. From 1994 to 2007 he was European Science Editor/Senior Correspondent for Chemical & Engineering News - the weekly news magazine of the American Chemical Society. He was then appointed Science Writer in Residence at Queen's University Belfast and Queen's University Ionic Liquid Laboratories for three years until 2010. He has written numerous news reports and articles on chemistry, the history of chemistry, and related topics. He is the author, co-author, or editor of some eight books on chemistry.

Born and raised in Southampton, Freemantle graduated in chemistry from Exeter University in 1964, obtained a PhD in chemistry at Birkbeck College, London University, in 1967, and was a postdoctoral research fellow at Oxford University until 1969. For the next two years he worked as an industrial development chemist, and then pursued a career in teaching at the Polytechnic of South Bank, London (1971-1974), University of Jordan, Amman (1974-1979), and Cranbourne School, Basingstoke, Hampshire (1979-1985), before taking up a post with IUPAC.

He lives in Basingstoke where he continues to take an interest in and write about chemistry and the history of chemistry.