anticoagulant

The Beginnings of Chemical Synthesis

Joe Schwarcz PhD — Tue, 22 Oct 2024 16:52:42 +0000

Chemistry can be roughly divided into two branches, analysis and synthesis. Chemists either try to identify existing substances or make new ones. By the early 19th century, a number of substances had been isolated from plants, with morphine from the poppy, quinine from cinchona bark, and coumarin from tonka beans being examples. However, given that these substances were derived from living species, they were believed to be endowed with a “life force” that could not be duplicated in the lab, and that such “organic” substances could not be synthesized.

A Dead Cow, Moldy Hay and Drug Discovery

Joe Schwarcz PhD — Thu, 31 Aug 2023 17:11:53 +0000

There are roughly 20,000 prescription medicines approved for use around the world and in developed countries two thirds of the population takes one or more of them. Then there are all the non-prescription drugs and the various supplements that claim to have some sort of therapeutic effect that vastly outnumber prescription drugs. Obviously, drug development is a gigantic business, which is understandable given that health matters more than anything else in life and drugs promise to help with a wide range of ailments.

Aspirin Can Do More Than just Alleviate Pain

Joe Schwarcz PhD — Thu, 08 Nov 2018 19:31:12 +0000

It is a common misconception that aspirin is a naturally occurring substance that was discovered in the bark of the willow tree. A related compound called salicin does indeed occur in white willow bark (not the “weeping willow,” thereby explaining the use of the bark as a medication since the time of Hippocrates. But salicin is very irritating to the stomach, a problem that prompted the Bayer company to look for an alternative. One of its chemists, Felix Hoffmann, synthesized acetylsalicylic acid in 1898 and found it to be a great improvement over salicin.