A 2024 scientometric study traced 107 Nobel laureates to the academic lineage of Adolf von Baeyer, the 1905 chemistry laureate. That count reflects advisor-student networks built over more than a century, not a single classroom. What truly passed down was a method of asking questions, not one research topic. Why the number 107 is the wrong thing to be shocked by If you look only at Adolf von Baeyer’s best known work, it is easy to file him under 19th century dye chemistry. Indigo, phenolphthalein, ring strain, organic synthesis, the 1905 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. But follow his academic lineage forward and the research subject keeps changing skin: from dyes…