Early scientists tried to create effervescent waters with curative powers, including Robert Boyle, Friedrich Hoffmann, Jean Baptiste van Helmont, William Brownrigg, Antoine Laurent Lavoisier, and David Macbride. In the early 1770s, Swedish chemist Torbern Bergman, and (separately) English scientist Joseph Priestley invented equipment for saturating water with carbon dioxide. In 1774, John Mervin Nooth demonstrated an apparatus that improved upon Priestley's design. In 1807, Henry Thompson received the first British patent for a method of impregnating water with carbon dioxide. This was commonly called soda water, although it contained no sodium bicarbonate.
