Arnold Miller Collins (1899-1982) was a chemist at DuPont who, working under Elmer Bolton and Wallace Carothers with Ira Williams, first isolated polychloroprene and 2-chloro-1, 3-butadiene in 1930.
[2] Collins attended Columbia College, graduating in 1921 with the AB degree.
[5] In March 1930, while distilling the products of the acetylene reaction, Collins obtained a small quantity of an unknown liquid, which he put aside in stoppered test tubes.
Further analysis showed that the mass was a polymer of chloroprene, formed with chlorine from the cuprous chloride catalyst.
[6] Following this breakthrough, DuPont began to manufacture its first artificial rubber, DuPrene, in September 1931.