Lewisite (More good common names)

Lewisite is nasty stuff - it's a compound of arsenic with two labile chlorines. As I mentioned yesterday, BAL is its antidote.

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Lewisite is a chemical weapon from a particularly brutal era in this regard, and you hear about it a lot less these days. However, there's still plenty floating around...

Have a good weekend.

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Lewisite is nasty stuff, which I'll cover tomorrow. Tonight, it's an antidote, which is simply the dithio analogue of glycerine. It enjoys the more colorful name of BAL, or British Anti-Lewisite. BAL is an antidote to Lewisite. It's one of the few compounds that enjoys the use of a longish common…
In the forensic laboratories of the 1920s, a chemist checking for poison could make a beaker glow with the brilliance of a gemstone.  Color tests, as they were called, derived from the fact that many toxic materials turn a specific hue if exposed to the right mixture of heat, cold, acid and base.…
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If you are interested in learning more about lewisite pleae see my book: Dew of Death: The Story of Lewisite, America's World War I Weapon of Mass Destruction

By Joel Vilensky (not verified) on 20 Oct 2007 #permalink