INTENSITY²
Start here => Games => Topic started by: Lestat on July 12, 2012, 11:56:07 AM
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Title says it all really. What are you all reading of late?
The big and bangin' pseudo-advanced drug chemistry, pharmacology and more thread V 2.0 on bluelight.
http://www.bluelight.ru/vb/threads/598070-The-Big-and-Bangin-Pseudo-Advanced-Drug-Chemistry-Pharmacology-and-More-Thread-V-2/page5 (http://www.bluelight.ru/vb/threads/598070-The-Big-and-Bangin-Pseudo-Advanced-Drug-Chemistry-Pharmacology-and-More-Thread-V-2/page5)
Got some interesting discussion going on there about SAR (structure-activity) of the dopamine and noradrenaline transporters, GABAa receptors and the nicotinic acetylcholine receptors
Solvent-free organic syntheses
using supported reagents and microwave irradiation
I've only read a little bit about microwave chemistry, but damn! some of whats been done looks absolutely fantastic. I've got a spare microwave too that I am giving serious thought to building a dedicated MW reactor for just that sort of thing. Talking about cutting reaction times from say, 5-6 hours giving for example, 40-50% yields of rxn product XYZ to >95% in 5-10 minutes :green:
The only concerns I have are safety-wise, one has to be very careful with microwaves, they boil water (and what are for instance, brains and eyeballs made out of, mostly? :eyebrows:)
But once built and appropriate shielding installed, that looks like quite a fantastic tool to add to the arsenal. At the moment, said MW oven is just sat on the top of my bedside cabinet, to hold my meds and a bunch of stuff like cookies, bottles of coke, candy, fags, syringes/needles/micron filters etc.
Lol, found it dumped, yes, actually dumped, outside tesco ages back. Watched it for a good while to make sure nobody had just set it down for a while, then walked up to it, tucked it under my arm and walked off with it. Tested it to see if it worked, and surprisingly, it does.
(as PDF file),
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http://www.intensitysquared.com/index.php/topic,5420.0.html (http://www.intensitysquared.com/index.php/topic,5420.0.html)
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Pet Sematary :nerdy:
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I'm on a dehoarding/desqualoring site, reading about mice. A member posted what I've heard before,
that if you see one mouse you probably have many more. Freaking out in a dignified, low-key way. :lol1:
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The Man Who Couldn't Stop, by David Adam. It's about OCD, basically, and I can highly recommend it.
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Mengzi (Mencius)
When I was a Slave, Slave Narratives
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Hi SG, welcome back. :)
Reading this board. :P
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An X-Files book.
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An X-Files book.
I have a Breaking Bad book! It's full of pictures and anecdotes! :heisenberg:
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That sounds cool. The X-Files book has two stories in it. No pictures unfortunately!
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Hi SG, welcome back. :)
Reading this board. :P
Thanks Odeon. *fist bump*
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Beauty and the Beasts
About the primatology field and the women who dominate it.
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Reading the Physical Reviews journals, 125 years of.
https://journals.aps.org/125years
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When I'm not reading my online course stuff, I have Neurotribes to read.
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Whats that?
And of late, I've been delving somewhat into the chemistry of the nitrile functional group (an organocyanide) for some, err, well things, that I've been a'pondering. And it might be doable with out the use or preparation, purification of via the truly noxious, deadly HCN gas, via an unusual phosphorus-iodine based reagent, diphosphorus tetraiodide, and while I need to buy more I2, I do have some, I just need to replenish my stocks of iodine so I'm not actually left without.
And phosphorus I have by the kilogram, should I ever want several kg of phosphorus at once (red phosphorus, although I can prepare white phosphorus from it, either directly fired under inert gas in a DIY single-use metal still, to avoid subjecting my beloved and highly prized glassware to abusive levels of heat needed to boil and distill white phosphorus, or else form a metal phosphide, and CAAAAAREFULLY, prepare phosphine gas ( a very, very deadly poison), as an intermediate and pass it diluted in inert gas through an externally heated pipe, to decompose phosphine to its component elements, leaving white phosphorus behind, but thats not a method I'd want to use unless I had need of a small quantity of very, very highly purified white phosphorus, such as if I were to undertake some manner of phosphorus radioisotope labelled phosphorus reagent and then use it to prepare a radioactively tagged compound or bit of genetic code based on a radioactive nucleic acid phosphodiester backbones, but otherwise I'd sooner avoid a phosphorus-based answer to the Marsh test given the obscenely toxic nature of phosphine gas (its PH3, the phosphorus version of ammonia, often comes along with diphosphine, P2H4, like diborane, its pyrophoric, and it, like PH3 is virulently poisonous stuff, so much so that catching on fire spontaneously on contact with air is a blessing, a lot of the simple binary nonmetal or semimetal hydrides of the kind XH3 or X2H4 where X=element from the pnictogen or chalcogen series, as well as boranes and other carbon related element hydrides are both pyrophoric and heinously toxic, including the chalcogen hydrides like H2S, H2Se and H2Te, the notorious rotten egg stench compound hydrogen sulfide, which is also, which is less widely known, about as deadly as cyanide and much more insidious*, hydrogen selenide and telluride are worse still, H2Se being considerably more toxic than H2S, I've never encountered H2Te and I really, really don't want to because tellurium compounds, if absorbed in even tiny concentrations tend to end up as the likes of dialkyl and alkyl tellurides, tellurols (the tellurium answer to an alcohol, phenol, thiol or thiophenol, or corresponding selenols, only with Te in place of O, S, or Se), and come out over a long, long time period from the victim, as some truly atrocious stinking stuff.
And I've HAD the sulfur version happen to me once, accidentally, which usually doesn't happen, but something happened to have a metabolic kink or two that hadn't been worked out or known at the time, or at least not to me. The stuff comes out in EVERYTHING, even tear fluid, even up your nose exudes noxious fumes of stinking sulfurous abominations that ruin (permanently, they had to be worn for a week, to avoid contact with other clothes, then burned in the middle of nowhere in black plastic sacks, double bagged when it was over)
Tellurium breath, as we chemists call the Te effect, where even traces of tellurium or compounds of it if absorbed by touch etc., come out like that is apparently SO bad people have killed themselves because of it. And things people afflicted with Te-breath have been in uni libraries etc. and EVERYONE knows just who picked out what book, by the fact that they are nearly unapproachably foul, from the touch of the poor cursed bastard's tellurium-laced, rotten leek-and-arse-and-sulfurous-horror-ish-abomination-laced fingerprints.
And bad enough that one record exists of a german chemist accidentally dropping a vial of dibutyl ditelluride on a train carriage. It broke, and they had to scrap the carriage. For good. It just wasn't, and never again ever would or could possibly be decontaminated to any extent that made it suitable for carrying either people or property. So AFAIK it was melted down for scrap metal for recycling, or else forever left somewhere.
From the very mildest, sulfur version, I really believe it. People turned and RAN 100s of feet down an open street. They turned round and ran the fuck away in the opposite direction as surely as if I had threatened rape and knife-murder, not necessarily in that option, of first their loved ones for them to watch then them.
It was an awful experience. Thankfully nobody hurt, although I saw enough evil looks on enough faces. But nobody ever came close enough to E.g swing a punch. I don't think they could.
I wouldn't have if I hadn't been stuck with inhabiting the source of the temporary reek :P as it was, it was coming out of everything from piss to skin to tears and as such, followed me a bloodhound in reverse, tracking you down and making you smell filthy.
*H2S and relatives, if the concentration is less than instantaneously lethal to the victim and the filthy stench doesn't drive them away then they tend to paralyze the olfactory nerve, and prevent the stench from being detectable, leading somebody to remain in the area and not take flight immediately to avoid ending up on fr.ex hydrogen sulfide's sneak-kill score tally. It stinks. Its relatives stink even worse by orders of magnitude. You are in the presence of enough to be lethal over time weighted exposure but not to kill in a single breath. Filthy stench stops being stinky. You think it's gone and all is safe. It hasn't and they aren't and it isn't. The problem isn't the gas, its you, because its paralyzed your sense of smell, lining up it's scope crosshairs for that one-shot silenced sneak-kill to ghost your ass)
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Downloaded and read: "The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning: How to Free Yourself and Your Family from a Lifetime of Clutter" by Margareta Magnusson
Weeble, I think you'd like it. It was a good read, not sad, and somewhat motivational.
Now working on: "The Year of Living Danishly: Uncovering the Secrets of the World’s Happiest Country"
....and exploring the Danish concept of "hygge" which I bet I'm fairly proficient at, but more coziness is always a good thing.
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Been reading a .PDF copy of a paper on the Appel reaction, (using a combination of carbon tetrachloride and triphenylphosphine to form a trichlorophenylphosphonium chloride, or similar bromide/iodide systems for formation of alkyl halides direct from the alcohols, without needing either expensive and usually restricted [not that the latter matters to me, I don't DO 'watch lists' or 'restricted'. I have my ways, and where there is a will, there is a way (or possibly a recently deceased relative:autism:), and I have places I can buy what I can't make from when I need such things) halogenating reagents, or systems like iodine or bromine with a catalytic amount of red phosphorus to form and in-situ, regenerate a phosphorus halide that then halogenates the alcohol. Red P and white phosphorus are somewhat watched or restricted as much LE pigs can have them be, so I prefer alternatives where there is one that means I don't need to dip into the 2kg red phosphorus I have. Although I can always buy more of the stuff in large tubs full.)
(red P/iodine can be used with an alcohol to form the useful alkyl or aryl iodide alkylating agents, such as MeI [methyl iodide], or a similar bromide system etc. for making alkyl or aryl bromides)
But the Appel reaction looks rather useful since it can be run under mild conditions, and avoids me having to use any of my phosphorus.
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Downloaded and read: "The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning: How to Free Yourself and Your Family from a Lifetime of Clutter" by Margareta Magnusson
Weeble, I think you'd like it. It was a good read, not sad, and somewhat motivational.
Now working on: "The Year of Living Danishly: Uncovering the Secrets of the World’s Happiest Country"
....and exploring the Danish concept of "hygge" which I bet I'm fairly proficient at, but more coziness is always a good thing.
What's this Scandinavian thing going on with you? :orly:
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Downloaded and read: "The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning: How to Free Yourself and Your Family from a Lifetime of Clutter" by Margareta Magnusson
Weeble, I think you'd like it. It was a good read, not sad, and somewhat motivational.
Now working on: "The Year of Living Danishly: Uncovering the Secrets of the World’s Happiest Country"
....and exploring the Danish concept of "hygge" which I bet I'm fairly proficient at, but more coziness is always a good thing.
What's this Scandinavian thing going on with you? :orly:
Not sure.
Last year my reading was focused towards India and exploring Hindu customs.
Forever curious I guess.
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What do you call an apostate hindu?
A hindont.
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Rereading The Wheel of Time series
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"Factfulness" by Hans Rosling.
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Some of the Chronicles Of Amber, immortal knight things from Roger Zelazny. One of his final, "Prince Of Chaos."
These are fun and so fast reading.
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Some of the Chronicles Of Amber, immortal knight things from Roger Zelazny. One of his final, "Prince Of Chaos."
These are fun and so fast reading.
I started reading that in the 70's (?), but the library only had the first book. Early this year I found the complete collection at the thrift store. I haven't started reading it because of reasons.
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I remember "Creatures of Light and Darkness". Not light reading at all.
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Some of the Chronicles Of Amber, immortal knight things from Roger Zelazny. One of his final, "Prince Of Chaos."
These are fun and so fast reading.
I started reading that in the 70's (?), but the library only had the first book. Early this year I found the complete collection at the thrift store. I haven't started reading it because of reasons.
Not sure about what reasons but I feel regret for those reasons you have had to suffer.
Pretty sure I have all the Roger Zelazny, Isaac Asimov, Larry Niven and a few other fun "light reading" books.
I consider heavy shit as something that I have to research almost every other line such as Shakespeare. I also have studied Asimov's Guide To Shakespeare (OH and the atheist's take on the interpretation of the Bible is second to none! You should go through that when you have time!) and some of it just blows me away. I had no idea for instance that Shakespeare was such an uneducated man in his time. His writings bring this out, once a proper context is established.
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Reading a rather interesting preparation of anhydrous hydrogen bromide, that's going to mean I can fuck off the setup I have up at the moment, thats proving a pain in the arse (essentially a pressure-equalized addition funnel leading to a two-neck flask, containing sodium bromide, the addition funnel containing 98% sulfuric acid, then because I couldn't find my damn gas taps and was feeling shitty because of a stomach upset, I jerry-rigged a pair of gas taps by sticking rubber tubing onto the vacuum takeoff of some fritted buchner funnels and by the miracle that is duct tape, 'stoppered' the top of the funnels, one connected to a wash bottle, then to a length of copper pipe, bent into a ==U== shape, and stuffed with fine copper dust, held at a red heat by means of a torch, the type that hooks up to a big gas bottle and can run for a good long time.
The copper is to cope with the fact that sulfuric acid is oxidizing, especially at high concentrations. An argon tank was hooked up to the HBr generating flask after the sulfuric was added, by means of the addition funnel, and some vacuum tubing, just to push the gases through the system. The oxidizing nature of H2SO4 means there was a fair lot of bromine generated as well as the desired hydrogen bromide. I was preparing a solution of anhydrous HBr in anhydrous acetic acid, at a 30% concentration of HBr the GAA (glacial acetic acid) as solvent, the hot copper scrubs the bromine, whilst the HBr passes through into an erlenmeyer filled with the desired quantity of anhydrous GAA, the flask standing on a digital scale, in order to register the quantity of hydrogen bromide absorbed.)
Quite a pain in the backside, maintaining the heating, watching the connections to the pipe.
I need to find those sodding gas taps.
This time, I'm going to prepare an azeotropic solution of hydrogen bromide in H2O, using in this case, phosphoric acid, since H3PO4 is not oxidizing and will liberate HBr without the bromine, eliminating the need for the red hot copper to scrub bromine, the Br2 was obvious with sulfuric acid, the entire gas generation flask turned orange-red, the rusty color of bromine, the liquid halogen which sits in between gaseous green chlorine, with its sharp, 'clinical' sort of smell, and dark, solid silvery iodine, which smells rather pleasant, much less sharp compared to chlorine.
Bromine on the other hand smells fucking vile. Sharp, penetrating and rather than the cleanly sort of odor, if unpleasant, of chlorine (I've never smelled fluorine gas, so can't comment on that one, and I don't want to either since it evolves lethal hydrofluoric acid, and is such a powerful oxidizing agent that a very dilute stream of fluorine gas will cause a brick to burst into intense, searing flaring flames), Br2 smells....sickening. Even through my gas mask, I need to replace the filters, a little got through, enough to detect the odor, and it smells...well 'bromos' in greek, is where the name comes from, the ancient greek word means 'stench' and I find it quite applicable, for the odor was rotten, stifling, like hydrogen sulfide (rotten eggs) only with sharp razorblades stuck in it, if that makes sense. Putrid.
The phosphoric acid version, involves making a conc. aqueous solution of hydrogen bromide, again using sodium bromide (I'll scrap the first version, and just add excess sulfuric acid and some peroxide to make damn sure its all oxidized to bromine, then distill off the Br2 and save it for future use, I had been meaning to prepare some elemental bromine anyway actually, already had a flask full of NaBr solution, although the method was to be passing chlorine gas through it, the more reactive halogen replacing the less reactive, and reacting as follows: 2NaBr+Cl2-->Br2+2NaCl)
Anyhow, it'll be phosphoric acid, aqueous NaBr, to produce sodium phosphate and HBr, then treated with triphenylphosphine, forming triphenylphosphonium bromide, extracted into either chloroform or dichloromethane, the product dried over anhydrous magnesium or sodium sulfate then the solvent (3x150ml extractions) pooled and stripped in vacuo, collecting the DCM or chloroform for recycling, followed by washing with ethyl acetate to remove any residual triphenylphosphine. Reported yield is near quantitative (97-98%) of Ph3P(+ charge on the phosphorus atom)HBr
The result, triphenylphosphonium bromide is heat-sensitive, although yields are variable, 60-90% if simply pyrolyzed. Reportedly adding the Ph3PBr to xylene and bringing it up to reflux decomposes the triphenylphosphonium bromide to triphenylphosphine and hydrogen bromide, allowing recycling of the TPP, distillation off of the xylene for recycle, and anhydrous, highly pure hydrogen bromide gas essentially 'on tap'. I figure I'll prepare a full mole of triphenylphosphonium bromide tomorrow, so I've got HBr as good as in a pressurized gas tank, only no renting a tank, no corrosion of regulators, just storage in anhydrous conditions, and I can use it whenever I want HBr.
And, I see a side use for it. Halogenating alcohols, to give useful alkyl halides. I figure, the intermediate of the Appel reaction, a reaction for chlorinating primary/secondary alcohols via SN2 nucleophilic substitution, there is a reaction between carbon tetrachloride and triphenylphosphine to form an intermediate triphenylphosponium chloride. Thats just changing the halogen from the intermediate reactive halogenating agent from Cl to Br. Probably even more useful actually, because bromine is a better leaving group than chlorine, so the typical use, as essentially a chemical 'stepping stone' for sticking other things on an alcohol, it'll give better yields.
Will have to experiment some with a similar preparation of hydriodic acid via decomposition of phosphorus triiodide made by mixing red phosphorus with elemental iodine (yes, just like making THAT substance) with water, decomposing the PI3 to HI, then I'll filter off the regenerated red phosphorus and dry it, then stick it in a container for storage.
I have to say, I'm getting to really love phosphorus chemistry, its so versatile. Triphenylphosphine, red phosphorus, white phosphorus, that toxic, violent , garlic-smelling little glow-in-the-dark tiger of an element, phosphorus trichloride, pentachloride, tribromide, pentabromide, PI3, P2I4...oh I am going to be busy as hell for a while and filling my lab logbooks with interesting and useful preparations for ages, not to mention making reagents of great versatility that are difficult and expensive for a private individual to buy, I can buy the likes of PCl3, POCl3, PCl5, PBr3 etc. but even I need to be resourceful in doing so.
But, I do have a kilo of triphenylphosphine, and 4x0.5kg tubs of red phossy. Especially with the way I like to recycle, that'll last me a while.
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Still reading Neurotribes - a bit at a time.
Lestat, you asked what it was. It's basically a history of autism, giving examples of autistics long ago and the emergence of psychologists who diagnosed autism/Asperger's. That's what I've read so far. I am a little more than halfway through.
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I'm so going to have to look up neurotribes to see if library genesis (aka libgen) has a copy. (yeah, its pirating, I haven't got a money tree in the back garden and I just think my near future costs have shot up...not sure which currency 'SEK' is, yet, but I doubt I want to know the exchange rate. I was thinking yesterday, during a synthesis that is kinda getting repurposed to produce bromine, I need some glassware intended for high-temperature operation that can take really harsh, nasty ass conditions at high temperatures for extended times, for things like that, stuff that involves a blowtorch, and things like mixtures of salt, sulfuric acid and oxidizing agents for producing chromyl chloride (at about 120 'C), or heating red phosphorus until it turns to the white allotrope, which is, strictly speaking doable in regular borosilicate glassware, but damn carefully, and I've had a failure doing just that, that catapulted burning willy pete across the garden like a string of chinese crackers, hissing, spitting and sending gouts of searing fire streaming meters down the lawn, burning the trajectories of the gobs of flaming phosphorus into the grass, which was marked for ages, first burnt to cinders, then fertilized by the phosphate-enriched soil and growing super lush compared to the rest of the lawn.
Need some fused quartz or vycor glass articles for that kind of thing, but I looked on ebay after reading up on it (vycor is a treated borosilicate glass that can take up to 1200 'C without cracking) but fuck me, even a few lengths of tubing are expensive, listed in hundreds of 'SEK'. Fucked if I want to know what it'll cost me to get a proper set of high-temp gear like that.
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SEK is Swedish Kronor.
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How much are they worth, roughly, relative to GBP or EUR or $$? I'm kinda hoping its one of those worthless currencies like turkish lira, but my hopes aren't so high :spazz: (I remember when I went on holiday to turkey, the exchange rate was about a million lira to a british pound. Quite a good holiday, brought back a HUGE marine snail shell as a souvenir, about 7 inches or so across, maybe more. One big sodding snail lived in there, horked it up from a scuba dive. Wish I'd have gotten footage of another dive though, octopus, shot out of its hidey hole and clamped itself on my face, just like one of those facehuggers from the alien movies, although a lot cuter.
Wasn't aggressive, just displaying exploratory behavior, interacting and, well, being a face-sucking octopus.
The currency there had so devalued due to inflation that you could pick up a packet of cigarettes for about 12-16 pence, three course meal, starter, main course and afters, plus apple tea to drink with your food, or and beer as desired, and after, one of the turkish specialities, their coffee, served in a tiny cup a couple of inches high, made in a little long-handled tall but narrow pot called a czeve, really spicy, rich, aromatic and the best coffee you'll ever taste, sweet, with a slight head of foam on top, served black, and so fucking strong you could almost melt a spoon with it :autism:
How much? a tenner. Main meal even kept piping hot atop a little liquid fuel (I think) burner, plate kept toasty, and as you go, some sweet turkish pastries. A tenner...and 12-16p a pack of fags..here, the shopkeep doesn't even make that on a pack of fags. Cost creeping closer to or even over £10 for 20 readymade ones (although I don't smoke those, I am a relatively light smoker now thanks to my e-cig, but the nicotine liquids unfortunately lack the minor alkaloids in tobacco such as harmala type alkaloids which act as MAOIs, and moduate the effects of nicotine, resuting in plain nicotine being unsatisfying, as e-liquid, and needs a little tender loving care courtesy of Lestat and the lab. At least when he's both got the spare burnable cash to order a vine which produces a goodly amount of those alkaloids, called Banisteriopsis caapi, used as the MAOI component of traditional ayahuasca visionary brews, in combination with a DMT containing plant, and often all sorts of other additions, far more esoteric, for a real witch's brew, unique to the shaman probably, so the vine of souls, it has become available online and I had the idea of extracting the alkaloids, which are some of them the same as those traces in tobacco only present in far greater quantities in the vine of souls, yage' (spoken 'ya'-hey') with one additional, tetrahydroharmine, which is again similar, same family similar reversible monoamine oxidase inhibitor effects, and splice the two together, with the synthetic nicotine, to see if I can give E-liquids that satisfaction back which they lack otherwise compared to tobacco. A bit of better living through chemistry and some amazonian basin region ethnobotany and I see the potential for a money spinner. Especially if producing the harmaline, tetrahydroharmine, which oughtn't be too hard given they are beta-carbolines and these are accessible via Pictet-Spengler cyclization of appropriately substituted tryptamines.
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~1 GBP = 12 SEK
This varies a lot, mostly because of frequent Brexit scares.
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Thanks, thats good to know that the exchange rate is fairly favourable. The prices looked (and still do really) horrendous. Asking about S 300+ for three pieces of vycor tubing, and for a single crystallization/evaporation dish, ~500, 250 or so for one small (250ml! in borosilicate standard lab glass I'd expect to pay between $5-10 for it, and free shipping likely as not) Vycor flask.
I need to get some though, but not much, and especially of the sort of stuff I need, like distillation and reflux equipment, and especially of significant capacity, that is going to be horrendously expensive.
Hundreds just for three pieces of tubing....jesus christ....but it IS impressive stuff, even more so than fused quartz, its extremely resistant to chemical assault, the only things to worry about being hydrofluoric acid, and searing hot, molten fused alkali hydroxides or very concentrated, very hot hydroxide solutions (not sure actually, if the likes of aqueous KOH would even attack Vycor at boiling temperatures, although molten alkalis at several hundred degrees 'C are another matter, and like HF will attack it (and people), although dilute HF can even be used clean Vycor glass, although it will take a few micrometers off the surface (10% aqueous hydrofluoric acid is used as a cleaning agent for it!)
And it is super-resistant to high temperatures. To put it in perspective, my borosilicate glass labware, is rated for up to a bit under 500 'C, for peak demands, whilst Vycor is rated for taking a real vicious roasting, at up to 1200 'C without cracking, and will take over 100 degrees rapid change as thermal shock without breaking.
So you can see why I want some, after reading about it. But fuck me, Vycor glass SO expensive, its a
borosilicate glass that has been given a special leaching treatment of some nature in order to give it a passivated surface layer of some sort, and a special recipe that makes it incredibly resistant to high atemperature and has a very, very low coefficient of thermal expansion, similar to how fused quartz will take a similarly vicious beasting, and either can be subjected to outright thermal brutality whilst full of searing hot acids (with the exclusion of course of hydrofluoric acid, and also phosphoric acid, but only
when it is both highly concentrated, containing a significant amount of polyphosphoric acids and also when heated, to at least 200 'C, with attack starting at etching of a few micrometers an hour or so at 300 'C and 70~80% phosphoric acid or thereabouts, and more significant when its at 400 to 700 'C, when its really really hot it can start doing serious damage, although it does, reportedly, passivate it against attack from hydrofluoric acid by forming a surface layer of SiO2-P2O5 that serves like armor plating, although I'd not trust anything bar teflon against HF, and specially made nickel alloys designed for handling HF like monel metal, because hydrofluoric acid is so fucking damn dangerous, a little spill, if its concentrated won't just burn, it'll penetrate intact skin, be absorbed systemically and both leach the calcium out of your blood, precipitating it and turning your blood to calcium fluoride sludge, triggering a massive heart attack from the severe hypocalcaemia, and agonizing pain, as it leaches the calcium out of your bones as it does, as if pausing for a light snack.)
I want a vycor set, not just a couple of pieces, although its how I'll have to buy it, item by item, a few hundred pounds to a grand or so at a time, and build it up until I've got a proper set. But first, will be distillation equipment for use in destructive distillations, as they are called, where something is, rather than a solvent solution being heated, a dry solid is distilled or flame-pyrolyzed with a blowtorch. The sort of process used for simultaneously converting red phosphorus to white phosphorus and distilling the WP to purify it under inert gas.
Thanks for the tip on the exchange rate odeon. Doesn't surprise me about the brexit thing though. I wish they would stop fucking about and get on with doing what they were told to do. If they had had a 'remain' vote then it would be in place and sealed with treaties and that poisonous fucking piece of shit traitor to the nation Theresa May's slobber, piss and vinegar. May she suffer a thousand devils to burn her eyes out over and over and over again for the rest of eternity when she dies. Devils be damned, she sure is, in both cases. Bitch. Traitor and poison dwarf god-damn accursed spawn of a syphilitic prostitute's manky, scabby train-tunnel vulva. Filthy traitorous toxic WHORE.
Fucking hell I so can't stand that piece of shit that calls itself prime minister. As bad as Bliar...ahem...Blair...
dly,
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~1 GBP = 12 SEK
This varies a lot, mostly because of frequent Brexit scares.
I can remember not so long ago our US dollars were about 1=2.5 against a pound. I think ours has moved a bit, but it seems as if the UK pound has dropped quite a bit.
Compared to Swiss franc for instance the US dollar has been stable for quite some time, but the UK pound has fallen dramatically against the Swiss franc since Brexit.
Maybe it is time for me to buy another Jaguar.
:autism:
(just kidding.)
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Mother Tongue - How English Got That Way
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Oh I just HAD to find this, when I've got something I need to do (set up a chlorine gas generator, and use it to prepare a batch of bromine, then distill the bromine for use), but oh well, there is a horror movie on TV, that I want to watch, and I do need to eat, so I may as well wait until the movie is over.
https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=7f0eC_olTJMC&pg=PA73&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false
This is just...oh yes, this is reading material. Nice.
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Not so much, but I have not done well with Stephen King. I have a bit of catching up to do.
Just now ... "Mr. Mercedes"
Kind of nice to read him again. Comforting in a way and yet a bit disturbing.
I have many of his to explore, yet.
Last was a few other older ones I have set aside for later. It is later now and I have had some time on my hands.
I feel good.
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I like King's work, some of it at least. Some more than others, although in that genre, I prefer Dean Koontz. IMO he's a lot better at 'fucked up shit'. Koontz has written more or less the only books that actually gave me the heebie jeebies (in other than a sense of 'implications on society, in a nonfictional sense'.
Got to tear myself away from my book on glutamate and GABA receptors&transporters now though, since I need to find my house keys, find somewhere to put a flask full of a rather nasty little mixture that's outside, held in one of my lab clamps (its a mixture of bromine and 99% concentrated sulfuric acid, something that would eat through human skin, flesh, fat and bone as if it were an acetylene torch being held against a thin stick of butter, leaving nothing but inorganic debris, flesh charred to graphite, bones turned into calcium sulfate/bromide salts, plenty of burning flesh and burnt fat, resulting in dehydration of the glycerin portion of fats to acrolein, probably itself being brominated as the stuff chews through someone, were it to contact skin, and if it isn't (possibly if it is, too) causing cancer just for fun.
Definitely not something I want to accidentally drop. So need to find a place for that, whilst I go get another flask out, and rig up a chlorine gas generator and an ice bath. Although first, while my hands are clean and not all errgh from wearing gloves for a long time without a break, I do so think, that I am going to stick a cheeseburger in my face. A double cheeseburger. With bacon. I can feel my stomach making a sort of squirgling noise, chirping 'feed me, feed me! NOW FUCKING FEED ME YOU BASTARD OR I'LL PUKE UP THROUGH YOUR NOSTRILS AND USE MY ACID SECRETIONS TO BITE YOUR SHITTING NOSE OFF, FEED....ME....NOW....FUCKER!'
I guess I better do what he says, he's armed with a load of acid and he's set to puke into my nostrils out of spite, if I don't do what he says :autism:
Suppose it'll give me a bit more time to get into that GABA/glutamate and their transporters book I've been reading though whilst I munch.
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Haven't been reading anything new the last couple of days.
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I'm reading In a Different Key which is similar to Neurotribes but easier to read. The are some boring bits like when Cure Autism Now and Autism Speaks is discussed and unfortunately there is a chapter featuring Alex Plank.
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Reading whitepapers. Peer reviews for a conference.
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Have just finished reading a Star Trek comic - the story about Nero and what happened before he turned into a baddie.
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The geology and history of Mt. Etna in Sicily!
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Hadrians Wall by William Dietrich. I know I'll look up some more of his books.
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Mists of Avalon. :(
I dont appreciate all the sex scenes. I just want to read a story, not be all aroused. Well, i really want to know how everything plays out... *sigh. too many damn sex scenes.
cant wait to move on to Stardust by Neil Gaiman. Previously i was chewing through Steven Brust novels (Vlad Taltos).
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A book about, Mistresses, Courtesans and such of the English Royal families since Henry the VIII. Talk about a tangled web of sex, deceit, treachery, pimping (Husbands,Uncles and Fathers steering daughters, nieces, wives in the Kings direction to satisfy his lusts and boredom and for their own profit. Little known fact, condoms (of con-dums) are an invention of the 1500's. :laugh: And when I spoke to Carla about it, she told me that the catholic church ban on any type of birth control came in 1960. LOL It's an interesting read albeit like trying to figure out the Gordion knot. Who slept with who and who navigated the intrigues of the royal court better and who......well, tangled web does not even begin to describe life back then. :zombiefuck:
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Mezzofanti's Gift. Sort of good, so far.
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John Fogerty of CCR biography, his book "Fortunate Son"
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Well dang. I finished Mists of Avalon (annoyed by all the sex scenes, not because I dislike sex or dislike scenes of intimacy- just that I dont feel like thinking about sex when I dont want to think about it).
BUT-- i finished the book and went and read about the author-- and apparently she had molested and raped her children, and turned a blind eye to her husbands child molestation. :(
I can't help but wonder if all the sex scenes were related in some way to a preoccupation she had with sex, particularly incest. >:(
*shudders
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The Bio of Greg Lake of "King Crimson" and "Emerson, Lake and Palmer", fame. The title is "Lucky Man". Just finished reading Paul Simon's "A life". :book:
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Essays on Medieval Visions
(Philosophy and society)
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Quite a lot of things.
A journal article on virotoxins (related to the deadly amatoxins found in death cap mushrooms in the genus Amanita, such as A.phalloides, the deathcap, as well as related to the phallotoxins, again found in A.phalloides), the virotoxins being produced not by deathcaps, but by Amanita virosa, and possibly the very, very rare A.verna, the destroying angel, and the spring or fool's mushroom respectively.
Also reading abook on carbonate esters, and synthesis ofsame by various different routes which are designed to avoid having anything at all to do with phosgene gas. Because its just about one of the nastiest, most heinous chemicals that I want fuck all to do with; it is just that awfully noxious.
A book on functional derivatives of carboxylic acids: http://colapret.cm.utexas.edu/courses/Chapter%2018.pdf
A particularly interesting journal article I haven't finished yet, because I'm busy getting my hands (well gloves) dirty doing some hands on actual chemistry. But interesting, its about two novel allotropes of tin and lead; anyone here heard of buckyballs? C60? basically spherical molecules composed of carbon atoms in interlocking ring structures. A novel allotrope, although by now familiar to science, of carbon.
Well here, are the tin and lead allotropes analogous to buckminsterfullerene; introducing, stannaspherene and plumbaspherene, apparently they can be made to encapsulate other atoms within the interior of the spheres, especially of plumbaspherene, which has the larger of the two cavities in the center. Can stick transition metals in there, or apparently at least palladium. I just wonder what use that might be for a catalyst for reductions using hydrogen gas under pressure...
Shit, I never realized lead even HAD an allotropic form until I read about plumbaspherene. I knew tin does, when it gets cold, tin undergoes an allotropic phase transition to become what is known as tin-pest, that turns tin from a metal with properties expected of a metallic element to becoming whitish grey, crumbly and powdery, perhaps closer to the white allotrope of arsenic than a metal. Once tin pest has set in on an object made of tin, the result is inevitable, it creeps and crawls slowly through the metal, turning it from grey, silvery metallic beta-tin to the soft, greyish crumbly alpha allotrope. Once it gets started, it renders the rest of the tin susceptible to further attack, so it takes a hold, and the phase change creeps over and through the rest, turning it all to nonmetallic alpha tin, aka tin pest, just like a disease, an infection.
http://casey.brown.edu/chemistry/research/LSWang/publications/273.
And this, the ebook publication on carbonate esters (CO2 esters formally although one cant just bubble carbon dioxide through an alcohol with a few drops of concentrated sulfuric acid, due to CO2 being such a weak acid; so more roundabout ways are needed, especially if one wishes to avoid phosgene.)
http://sci-hub.tw/10.1002/14356007.a05_197
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Someone on one of the chem forums I'm on was good enough to upload a copy of Vogels' Practical Organic Chemistry 5th edition, as an ebook. A very thorough book by a most competent chemist, about lab techniques. I feel like I've improved my inert gas techniques already, even before I've had an opportunity to use it in practice. Just the reading, now more au fait with using argon and nitrogen atmospheres for conducting reactions, looking forward to putting it to practice soon, when I next have occasion to perform a Bouveault-Blanc reduction, which needs an inert atmosphere plus preparation of thoroughly anhydrous solvents, distillation of solvents directly from flask to flask, accomodating pressure changes, in previously flame-dried glass, as it makes use of sodium metal, added to anhydrous alcohol, to effect a reduction, often used for esters to primary alcohols, although in this case, it'll be for ketoximes to primary amines.
I just need to buy myself some more pure ethanol, well almost, just 5% H2O in it that will need carefully removing after I buy it. already got my ketoximes of choice, and a big brick of sodium metal. Which itself, given the size of it, will need rather careful handling, I'll scale the reaction to do multiple batches so the entire block can be used immediately after a test reduction on a smaller scale, so the rest of the sodium can be used up. Soft enough a metal to be cut with a knife, like stiff candle wax almost, but needs storage under oil, or something like hexane, petrol etc. to prevent it bursting into flames and going 'boom', which I imagine the large block of sodium I have to be pretty good at, size taken into account. Still, nothing I can't handle easily enough, but reading Vogels' has helped me improve my inert gas techniques already :)