Group 12 element people in the 17th century. German chemist Andreas Marggraf is usually given credit for discovering pure metallic zinc in a 1746 experiment by heating a mixture of calamine and charcoal in a closed vessel without copper to obtain a metal. Experiments on frogs by the Italian doctor Luigi Galvani in 1780 with brass paved the way for the discovery of electrical batteries, galvanization and cathodic protection. In 1880, Galvani's friend, Alessandro Volta, invented the Voltaic pile. The biological importance of zinc was not discovered until 1940 when carbonic anhydrase, an enzyme that scrubs carbon dioxide from blood, was shown to
Calamine brass company (within whose monopoly it was) to build a brass works at Isleworth. However a decade later the company obstructed the owners from mining calamine. A plaque at Tintern Abbey claims that the well-known brassworks at this site began in 1568. New brass works were built by Jacob Momma, a German immigrant in 1649 at Esher, probably using Swedish copper. After the passing of the Mines Royal Act in 1689, further works were built near Bristol, where brass production became a major industry in the 18th century. Later brass production sites in England included Cheadle and Birmingham. Calamine brass was