All History articles – Page 6
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Opinion
Letters: January 2022
Readers reminisce, consider the limits of trust and continue the debate on chemical nomenclature
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Feature
Thomas Midgley and the toxic legacy of leaded fuel
Leaded petrol was around for 100 years, and the campaign against it for almost as long. Mike Sutton reveals its history
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Opinion
June Lindsey, another forgotten woman in the story of DNA
Her discovery of adenine and guanine’s structure was a key part of solving the DNA double helix puzzle – yet her contributions are almost forgotten
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Research
Simple campfire chemistry hints how ancient humans produced pigments
Process to make red ochre didn’t require close control of temperature
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Research
Prehistoric Iberians poisoned by cinnabar almost 5000 years ago
Analyses of mercury levels in bones reveal ancient artists suffered for their craft
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News
Van ’t Hoff’s Amsterdam lab becomes historic chemical landmark
Now a café and exhibition space, the building once contained the first chemistry Nobel prize winner’s research space
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Opinion
Rethinking our relationship to nature
How the scientific revolution made it culturally permissible to exploit the environment
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Opinion
James LuValle, a chemist who broke the colour barrier
Sports or science? There was never really any competition for a Black Olympian who made significant contributions to Kodak’s colour film, as Hayley Bennett discovers
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Opinion
The seabirds saved by synthetic chemistry
How an agricultural demand for bird poo almost destroyed an island group’s ecosystem
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Opinion
Volta’s ink spills its secrets
Chemical analysis of manuscripts can reveal details of their author’s life and motivations
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News
Karolinska Institute pursues name changes to lose racist links
Home of medicine Nobel prize to rename building and two streets named after racist scientists
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Opinion
Weininger’s Smiles
The man whose code – and attitude to life – brought much happiness to chemists
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Opinion
Timmers’ towers and Straus’ flasks
The revolutionary system that made labs much less likely to go up in flames
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Research
Blasts from the past – how medieval gunpowder changed over 100 years
Test-firing different gunpowders in a replica 15th century cannon on the firing range at West Point showed how recipes evolved
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Research
Marie Antoinette’s secret messages to Swedish count revealed by chemical analysis
Spectroscopy deciphers censored passages in 200-year-old letters between last French queen and the man rumoured to be her lover
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Opinion
Science as a product of culture
The role of background beliefs and assumptions in the development of science
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News
Explainer: The science of alkyl nitrites aka poppers
From their origins as 19th century angina treatment to becoming an important part of gay subculture, these recreational drugs exist in a legal limbo
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Opinion
The lifesaving work of Evelyn Hickmans
Anne Green tells us how a female chemist almost single-handedly established paediatric clinical chemistry and led to a first in global health