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In 1856, a young chemistry whiz failed so spectacularly at whipping up a cure for malaria, he accidentally invented the color mauve. He also accidentally opened up an entirely new field of science. A field that synthesized everything from perfumes, to pesticides, to perhaps some pills inside your medicine cabinet right now.
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Sources: https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/e/2PACX-1vSTPnLcYLNu7nB36-LC0ehIc-0S9Qt9eh1eNMmV9amWVYPa7HGKjO5ErVcOFuVLfxoe8Zb1w8LKY510/pub
This is why societies should always invest in science. We don't know what we don't know.
"A young chemist" *Shows Santa*
Historically purple dye was hard to make thus it's being reserved for royalty. Synthetic purple sounds like a game changer.
Can you imagine what a sensation it would be to show up at a fancy event back then with an outfit dyed some new colour like this that _nobody had been able to make_ before, while everybody else is wearing the limited colours they actually could use?
Anyone else appreciate that they changed the background lighting to mauve?
I want to point out that, since purple was the color of Roman emperors, when mauve was invented it was part of MEN's fashion. That's why Eugenie and Victoria adopting it became such a sensation back then.
I had to pause the video to look up if I've been pronouncing "mauve" wrong my whole life. No. I've apparently been pronouncing it the British way. I am not British.
(me in the 1800s): wake up babe, new color just dropped
1:30 crazy how hard life was back in the day, he already looked like an 80 year old man at age 13
"he made it work, somehow" with a sizable loan from his dad
I am a little surprised that you left out the making of the synthetic flavoring vanillin from coal tar. To me, the thought of making a yummy flavor from that particular leftover goop is amazing
Waste is just poorly organized matter.
After the success with Aspirin, Bayer tried acetilisation with morphine. The result was Heroin (Bayer sure were good at coming up with brand names). Which was marketed as cough medicine for some time...
9:42 IT AAAAAALWAYS COMES BACK TO MALARIA OR TUBERCULOSIS, HUH?
The thumbnail made me wonder. So I googled Mauve, and none of the colors matched the thumbnail. The biggest descriptive distinction being the word "muted" the thumbnail is neon or bright.
Mauvelous! Simply Mauvelous!
Felix Hoffmann also invented a method to synthesize diamorphine while trying to produce codeine out of morphine. Bayer marketed this new product then as Heroin. That was one year before he synthesized Aspirin the first time.
I like to mauve it mauve it
The acetyl molecule is also what gives aspirin its pain reducing ability (for headaches ect) - salicylic acid alone is anti-inflammatory and only reduces pain indirectly
Perfume and pesticide and pills, oh my!