ABSTRACT
Citric acid derives its name from the Latin citrus, the citron tree, the fruit of which resembles a lemon. The acid was first isolated from lemon juice in 1784 by Carl Scheele, a Swedish chemist (1742-1786), who made a number of discoveries important to the advance of chemistry, amongst them hydrofluoric, tartaric, benzoic, arsenious, molybdic, lactic, citric, malic, oxalic, gallic and other acids as well as chlorine, oxygen (1772, published in English in 1780, predating the discovery by Priestly in 1774), glycerine and hydrogen sulphide. Citric acid was thus one amongst many natural organic acids.
