1932-

American chemist who in 1962 produced the first compound containing a noble gas. Previously, scientists had believed that the noble gases were incapable of undergoing reactions. Bartlett's discovery involved combining the noble gas xenon with the highly reactive gas fluorine. The compound that resulted was xenon hexafluoroplatinate(V); its chemical formula is Xe(PtF₆)_x, where x varies from 1 to 2. Scientists have since discovered that fluorine will also react with the noble gases argon and krypton.