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Article: Nature's building blocks: an a-z guide to the elements. (Elemental History).
- Article from:
- Chemistry and Industry
- Article date:
- June 3, 2002
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2002 Society of Chemical Industry. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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John Emsley
Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001
In Ben Jonson's 'The alchemist' a proposal is made: 'To think that nature in the earth bred gold! Perfect in the instant: something went before! There must be remote matter.'
Three and a half centuries later, Carl Sagan in his book 'Cosmos' was able to be much more certain that 'red giants and supernovae are the ovens and crucibles in which matter has been forged.' In between, chemistry evolved out of the attempts at transmutation of base metals into gold by alchemists. Even the best efforts of those such as Paracelsus, who did invent laudanum (a mixture of alcohol and opium derivatives), and ...