When he eventually switched to chemistry, it was
not to the mathematical province of physical chemistry but to organic
chemistry While attempting to find an efficient catalyst for the process
of methylation, he noted that Zn in diethyl ether had been used for this
purpose and wondered whether the Mg/ether combination might be
successful Grignard reagents were first reported in 1900 and Grignard
used this work for his doctoral thesis in 1901 In 1910, Grignard obtained
a professorship at the University of Nancy and in 1912, he was awarded
the Nobel prize for Chemistry which he shared with Paul Sabatier who
had made advances in nickel catalysed hydrogenation