A Potash Primer
Ash from burnt wood, weeds, bracken, and kelp helped fuel the Industrial Revolution.
When Did Alchemy End?
Despite royal prohibition, transmutation efforts continued underground long after the widely accepted dates for their demise.
Marie Curie and Polish Resistance
The two-time Nobel winner helped preserve her native Polish language, and undertook her education, at a time when these acts were potentially treasonous.
The Invention of the Test Tube
Chemists learned to blow their own glass vessels in the nineteenth century. It definitely beat using wine glasses.
The Chemist Whose Work Was Stolen from Her
The Black scientist Alice Ball helped develop a treatment for leprosy in the early twentieth century. But someone else took the credit.
Will Graphene Deliver on Its Promise?
Strong, stable, and conductive at one atom thick, graphene has amazing potential in a variety of applications. But is hype all the material has?
What We Mean By “Better Living”
How advertising used the phrase “better living” to portray big business as a force for moral good and continuous progress.
Artificial Photosynthesis
What is artificial photosynthesis, how does it work, and why would we need it?
Chinese Peasants Taught the USDA to Farm Organically in 1909
A hundred years later, we are still learning.