William Arthur Bone FRS (19 Mar 1871 - 11 Jun 1938) was a British fuel technologist and chemist.

He was born in Stockton-on-Tees

Stockton-on-Tees

Stockton-on-Tees is a market town in north east England. It is the major settlement in the unitary authority and borough of Stockton-on-Tees. For ceremonial purposes, the borough is split between County Durham and North Yorkshire as it also incorporates a number of smaller towns including...

, the son of tea merchant Christopher and Mary Elizabeth Bone. He was educated at Middlesbrough High School

Middlesbrough College

Middlesbrough College, located on one campus at Middlehaven, Middlesbrough, England, in the ceremonial county of North Yorkshire, is the largest college in the Tees Valley.-Admissions:...

, the Ackworth Quaker school

Ackworth School

Ackworth School is an independent school located in the village of High Ackworth, near Pontefract, West Yorkshire, England. It is one of eight Quaker Schools in England. The school is a member of the Headmasters' and Headmistresses' Conference and SHMIS . The Head is Kathryn Bell, who succeeded...

 and Stockton High School

Grangefield School

Grangefield School and Technology College is a Technology College located on Oxbridge Avenue, Grangefield, Stockton-on-Tees, England. It is opposite Stockton Cricket Club.-History:...

. After a year at the Leys School

The Leys School

The Leys School is a co-educational Independent school, located in Cambridge, England, and is a day and boarding school for about 550 pupils aged between 11 and 18 years...

, Cambridge

Cambridge

The city of Cambridge is a university town and the administrative centre of the county of Cambridgeshire, England. It lies in East Anglia about north of London. Cambridge is at the heart of the high-technology centre known as Silicon Fen – a play on Silicon Valley and the fens surrounding the...

 he studied at the University of Manchester

University of Manchester

The University of Manchester is a public research university located in Manchester, United Kingdom. It is a "red brick" university and a member of the Russell Group of research-intensive British universities and the N8 Group...

 to study chemistry

Chemistry

Chemistry is the science of matter, especially its chemical reactions, but also its composition, structure and properties. Chemistry is concerned with atoms and their interactions with other atoms, and particularly with the properties of chemical bonds....

 and physics

Physics

Physics is a natural science that involves the study of matter and its motion through spacetime, along with related concepts such as energy and force. More broadly, it is the general analysis of nature, conducted in order to understand how the universe behaves.Physics is one of the oldest academic...

, which was followed by a scholarship year at the University of Heidelberg.

After a few years at Manchester studying hydrocarbon

Hydrocarbon

In organic chemistry, a hydrocarbon is an organic compound consisting entirely of hydrogen and carbon. Hydrocarbons from which one hydrogen atom has been removed are functional groups, called hydrocarbyls....

 combustion

Combustion

Combustion or burning is the sequence of exothermic chemical reactions between a fuel and an oxidant accompanied by the production of heat and conversion of chemical species. The release of heat can result in the production of light in the form of either glowing or a flame...

 he was appointed in 1906 the Livesey Professor at the University of Leeds

University of Leeds

The University of Leeds is a British Redbrick university located in the city of Leeds, West Yorkshire, England...

. There he set up a new department of Fuel Technology and continued to study the mechanics of fuel combustion. In 1912 he made his last move, this time to Imperial College, London, again concentrating on the investigation of combustion. During World War I (1914–18) he carried out research on fuel problems associated with the war and trained chemists for duties in munition factories. He retired in 1936.

He published several books; Coal and its Scientific Uses in 1918, Flame and Combustion with D.T.A.Townend in 1927 and Coal and its Constitution and Uses with G.W.Himus in 1936.

He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1905. He delivered their Bakerian Lecture

Bakerian Lecture

The Bakerian Lecture is a prize lecture of the Royal Society, a lecture on physical sciences.In 1775 Henry Baker left £100 for a spoken lecture by a Fellow on such part of natural history or experimental philosophy as the Society shall determine....

 in 1932 (on hydrocarbon combustion) and was awarded their Davy Medal

Davy Medal

The Davy Medal is awarded by the Royal Society of London "for an outstandingly important recent discovery in any branch of chemistry". Named after Humphry Davy, the medal is awarded with a gift of £1000. The medal was first awarded in 1877 to Robert Wilhelm Bunsen and Gustav Robert Kirchhoff "for...

 in 1936 "For his pioneer work on contact catalysis

Catalysis

Catalysis is the change in rate of a chemical reaction due to the participation of a substance called a catalyst. Unlike other reagents that participate in the chemical reaction, a catalyst is not consumed by the reaction itself. A catalyst may participate in multiple chemical transformations....

and his researches on the mechanism of combustion of hydrocarbons and on the nature of flames and on gaseous explosions".

He was married twice: firstly in 1896 to Kate Hind, daughter of the Mayor of Stockton, with who he had a son and two daughters before her death in 1914 and secondly in 1916 to Mabel Isabel Liddeard, who died in 1922.