Arsenic

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Do not eat

Arsenic (As) is the 33rd element in the periodic table. It is also one of the deadliest. It is beautiful and mysterious, at once a coquette and a killer. It is one of the few elements that doesn’t have a liquid state at atmospheric pressure; it sublimates once heated thoroughly. So do lots of people. Get over it.

Contents

[edit] "Destroys household pests”

  • Arsenic is a key component in pesticide, herbicide, and insecticide.
  • Used in older pressure-treated wood, it poses a health hazard if burned.
  • It was also, formerly, used as embalming fluid until its danger to embalmers was discovered.[1]
  • It is very effective when used as a cure in homeopathy[2]

[edit] Ministry of silly molecule names

  • Arsole (C4H5As) is, as one might wager, a heterocyclic aromatic compound - colloquially you'd call it a ring.
  • Cacodyl (C4H12As2) stinks like, well, caca.
  • Arsine (AsH3) is a very nasty flammable and lethally toxic gas, and definately not something that one would want to be arsing around with.

[edit] See also

  • GFAJ-1, living critters that allegedly can eat arsenic without negative consequences. This is not actually all that remarkable: eurkaryotes (multi-cellular organisms) are more susceptible to chemical poisoning because they have complex biochemistries where lots of different types of cells must interact together. Prokaryotes (single-celled organisms) however, find it a lot easier to cope with some unpleasant chemical, as they can often stuff it into a cell vesicle and, if they are lucky, evolve a way to deal with it. This is why it is a Bad Idea to pollute the oceans with toxic chemical waste, as it may well be eaten by legions of pelagic superbugs who will evolve to rise out of the deep and wreak a terrible revenge upon the world. Although you may think this happened only the plot of a Bad B-Movie, it actually did happen in earth's prehistory when photosynthesizing microorganisms manage to pollute the entire planet's atmosphere with oxygen and totally alter geochemistry and life on earth for ever. Gosh. (Sorry, we were talking about arsenic, right...?)

[edit] Footnotes

  1. Old Cemeteries, Arsenic, and Health Safety
  2. Yeah right
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