6 ms·
"A chance discovery occurred when one of the scientific team, Federica Bertocchini, an amateur beekeeper, was removing the parasitic pests from the honeycombs i
by Clanan 9y ago
"A chance discovery occurred when one of the scientific team, Federica Bertocchini, an amateur beekeeper, was removing the parasitic pests from the honeycombs in her hives. The worms were temporarily kept in a typical plastic shopping bag that became riddled with holes."
What a great accident.
- jacquesm 9y agoThe history of science is full of such accidents, the discovery Penicillin being one of the most famous. http://www.kidsdiscover.com/quick-reads/penicillin-found-functional-fungus/ http://www.kidsdiscover.com/quick-reads/penicillin-found-fun...
- cubano 9y agoI've always been amazed that Shockley's discovery of the transistor was also by accident... https://books.google.com/books?id=mykDAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA80&lpg=PA80&dq=shockley+transistor+accident&source=bl&ots=zzOU1geWEU&sig=cBOQp3vLwM1UelVBs2mfjK4pFlU&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwioy-qI7b3TAhWGi1QKHfJiCYoQ6AEIZjAJ#v=onepage&q=shockley%20transistor%20accident&f=false https://books.google.com/books?id=mykDAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA80&lpg=P...
- booleandilemma 9y ago"The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not 'Eureka!' but 'That's funny...'" Isaac Asimov
- merraksh 9y agoA less important result for mankind, but still by accident: the microwave oven. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microwave_oven#Discovery https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microwave_oven#Discovery
- smueller1234 9y agoMaybe the antithesis to the discovery of antibiotics is the mostly accidental discovery of Tabun: "In January 1937, Schrader observed the effects of nerve agents on human beings first-hand when a drop of tabun spilled onto a lab bench." (Wikipedia) I think that one might stand out somewhat since I'd expect most accidental advances to be helpful to humanity. Or maybe I'm just an optimist. :)
- jacquesm 9y agoScientists that voluntarily work to bring such stuff in the world are amongst the people I least respect. It's one thing to be dumb, quite another to be extraordinarily gifted and to use that gift to do something which has no upside at all and plenty of downside. Exposing them to their own creations would be poetic justice.
- mynameisvlad 9y agoI mean, it's not like they're going into it knowing they're about to create a nerve agent. It even says in the history for Tabun on Wikipedia [0] that it was initially meant to be an insecticide. Sarin was similarly created as a way to find stronger pesticides, and IIRC so was Zyklon B, used in the holocaust. So some of these scientists may not have known what their creations were going to be used for. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tabun_(nerve_agent) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tabun_(nerve_agent)
- jacquesm 9y agoAfter making a demonstration to the army and being set up with a lab by the army and being asked specifically to weaponize your research (and fill projectiles with it) I don't think there should be any 'we didn't know' excuses. It's pretty clear that even if insecticide was the beginning there was a pretty clear point in time where it was obvious that this had nothing to do with insects any longer.
- mynameisvlad 9y agoAnd at that point what are they going to do? Say no? Okay, then they'll get someone else to take your work and weaponize it. The bulk of the work would have already been done by then, which is synthesizing the chemical and showing its effects on people.
- jacquesm 9y agoPrinciples are pointless if there is no price to pay. By your reasoning you can excuse away any behavior. Which of course plenty of scientists and other horrible people tried to do. And then there was the collective amnesia epidemic of 1945.
- badosu 9y agoI like how LSD was discovered [0]. It's so potent that it can be absorbed just by skin contact, that's why police must use gloves when seizing it. Imagine yourself coming home with your bicycle and having a massive (250 ug) LSD trip only having experienced it once, pretty scary and interesting at the same time [1]. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Hofmann#Discovery_of_LSD https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Hofmann#Discovery_of_LS... [1]: http://www.thegooddrugsguide.com/articles/lsd_accident.htm http://www.thegooddrugsguide.com/articles/lsd_accident.htm
- dmix 9y agoDespite the movies showing weird/scary trips, LSD is a very comforting, pleasant, and soft experience. You don't see things or talk to objects, at most you see some visual stimuli, like blending colors. People who say that they were hallucinating have never tried it or are lying. It would definitely be a surprise though if it was unexpected. A possibly pleasant experience depending on the person though... Definitely the most memorable experiences I've ever had (I agree with Steve Jobs there).
- badosu 9y agoThe paranoic stimuli and possible unfolding of latent mental conditions can't be underestimated though.
- RealityVoid 9y ago"possible unfolding of latent mental conditions" Interesting, can you expand on this? First time I hear this. I know someone that told me of a friend of his that hid some LSD at a border crossing close to the body and as a result of the trip, the guy got severe permanent psychatric damage in that he's currently residing in an institution. I thought he was full of shit, but if what you're saying is true, he might not have been.
- dmix 9y agoThat sounds like the typical word of mouth story FUD that spreads about LSD. I'd be curious to hear more evidence of this "uncovering latent mental illness" as well.
- Houshalter 9y agoI love the stories of how various artificial sweeteners were discovered. Every single one was found by someone accidentally (or intentionally...) tasting some random chemical from a lab. This leads to some interesting questions: How many random chemicals did scientists accidentally ingest for every artificial sweetener discovered? It must be quite a lot, and many of those must have been quite dangerous. Would we have artificial sweeteners at all if people practiced decent lab safety? Could we massively speed up the discovery of future sweeteners and similar things, by intentionally exposing people to as may random chemicals as possible? Ideally after verifying they are at least probably safe in a very small quantity for tasting. I'm guessing that wouldn't be legal.
- SonicPenguin 9y agoFive years ago my balcony was invaded by fly larvae (maggots i guess) because my flatmate left some raw meat in the trash bin. While trying to contain the invasion, i put some of them in two or three nested plastic bags, but they ALWAYS found their way through the plastic after some minutes. They were literally making holes in them. I thought this was normal and well-known!
- justinclift 9y agoWell, while might be possible they were properly digesting/biodegrading the plastic involved, it's also possible they were just "chewing holes" in the plastic. eg mechanical action making the plastic smaller, but not changing its chemical structure The caterpillars in the linked article are biodegrading the plastics into non-plastic (fairly quickly). That's the key thing.
- nommm-nommm 9y agoWell if you put me in a plastic bag I would also be able to get out by tearing a hole in the plastic bag. That fact doesn't say anything about my ability to metabolize plastic though. I would never even consider the worms were doing anything else but mechanically chewing the plastic.
- Raphmedia 9y agoAs any reptile owner will tell you, wax worms will eat through plastic containers so you should store them in glass. It's common knowledge. It is however amazing that nobody (me included) never thought that this could be a solution to our plastic issues. "It's common knowledge, why waste time thinking about it?"
- mhb 9y agoAlso, the really clever part was suspecting and then testing that the plastic isn't just mechanically broken down.
- developerdanny 9y agoBy squishing loads of bugs on some plastic. Reminds me of the playground!
- aaron_m04 9y agoThey probably assumed scientists already knew about it but didn't think it was a bid deal.
- Raphmedia 9y agoI wonder how many things are hidden that way.
- burntwater 9y agoIt's (apparently) common knowledge among reptile owners. That doesn't mean it's common knowledge among the particular scientists studying how to decompose plastics. Siloed knowledge will always be a problem (at least among humans. With omnipresent AI, that could change...).
- wyldfire 9y agoA day in the life of the omnipresent AI's keeper involves a lot of "Oh, no, sorry, CleverBot2000, we can't solve that global problem that way. This domain's model is incomplete, I guess."
- ismail 9y agoInteresting that a study was reported on the exact same site, but in 2014. https://m.phys.org/news/2014-12-gut-bacteria-worm-degrade-plastic.html https://m.phys.org/news/2014-12-gut-bacteria-worm-degrade-pl...
- vanderZwan 9y agoCould be the same bacteria mentioned in the Caterpillar article here: > Scientists say that the degradation rate is extremely fast compared to other recent discoveries, such as bacteria reported last year to biodegrade some plastics at a rate of just 0.13mg a day.
- greggyb 9y ago.13mg of plastic per day per _____? How many bacteria, or what weight or volume of bacteria? .13mg of plastic per day per bacterium would be incredible; per kg of bacteria would be not so amazing.
- gcb0 9y agohighlight Bertrand Russell's praise of idleness. if the person were too devoted to her work, it would have never produced the breakthrough allowed via her seemingly unrelated hobby.