Chubbyemu
Published on Dec 11, 2017
This is based on the true story of Professor KW.

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Slices of SIB
1 month ago
So the gloves are no use??
- NurdRage
1 year ago
organomercury compounds of one of the few things i refuse to work with for exactly this reason. Keep up the good work. Awesome video
- Miley onDisney
1 month ago
KW was Karen Wetterhahn (October 16, 1948 – June 8, 1997). She was an American professor of chemistry at Dartmouth College, New Hampshire, who specialized in toxic metal exposure.
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MGlBlaze
10 months ago (edited)
This is why you hear stories of scientists (chemists specifically, I imagine) that absolutely refuse to work with organic mercury compounds. It's profoundly nasty stuff - I knew that much. I hadn't known exactly what it does once it does get absorbed in to the body, though. And I didn't appreciate how dense mercury was in dimethylmercury.
Her death did serve to shore up safety regulations at least, though losing someone so brilliant and knowledgeable is never a good thing.
Your videos are absolutely fascinating.
- Bobbie Moss
2 weeks ago
I knew a lady who fell asleep with a glass thermometer that broke in her mouth. She came into our jewelry store because all her gold jewelry that she was wearing seemed to be disintegrating. Her bracelet, necklace, etc. My boss asked questions - yes, headaches, weight loss, no sleeping. He asked her if she had been around mercury and she told him what happened with the thermometer. He told her to go to the emergency room right away. I never did find out what happened.
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Buffalo
1 month ago
I remember my my science teacher in school some getting a petri dish of regular Mercury and deliberately poring some on the back of her hand and when we asked "won't that make you go crazy or something?" she replied "Would you even be able to tell the difference?"
It wasn't the organic type like in this video though.
- Miley onDisney
1 month ago
I'm an old man. When I was about 8 or 9, I was at a school science fair and there was a display that had a small bottle of mercury on the table. I swiped it. Got it home and played with it a bit. Don't remember at all what I did with it, but chances are pretty good that I would have touched it with my bare hands. It was pretty neat stuff, but apparently not the same kind this poor woman handled. I can think of plenty of narrow escapes I've had with life. Like the time getting drunk saved my life - I couldn't make it for the trip to Pike's Peak because I was so hung over, so someone else took my place as a counselor for all the troubles teens. Three counselors and 11 teens fell to their deaths. Life is full of stories like that.
- Jm Cresencio
1 month ago
the only problem was that Dimethyl mercury is a chemical that has the acute toxicity symbol; which literally means that going above the lethal dosage of the chemical, no matter what value, will kill you. Unlike irritants which can have curable diseases if ever you go beyond the lethal dosage, acute toxins, on the other hand, will GIVE YOU CERTAIN DEATH... With this definition, it's not surprising that that's what happened to her. It's the sad truth but that's why chemicals classified as acute toxins should be handled with EXTREME CARE(and with that, I mean you shouldn't come into contact, directly or indirectly, with these chemicals as much as possible) no matter what
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Dennis Holliday
1 week ago
I feel the main problem was: How did the SCIENCE COMMUNITY not know the difference in the two types of mercury??. How come they just assumed the gloves would be protective for BOTH types of mercury? Basic science teaches that there is a WORLD of difference between ORGANIC and INORGANIC compounds. They are scientist . They should have done test beforehand for each type of mercury to be sure the gloves worked for both types. So some scientist dropped the ball when they ignored that critical difference.
- Raynedog00
1 month ago
At least she's not stuck in a body that doesn't work. Her passing away was a mercy in the end. My father overdosed on opiates and fell into a coma for several months. His mother (my grandmother obviously), myself, and all his friends who knew about it all told my mother to just let him go as there was maybe a 1% chance he'd come out of it ok. He drilled into me, and everyone that knew him, that if he ever became unable to function on his own, if he couldn't drive or wipe his own ass that he'd much rather be dead. However my mother refused to pull the plug. He came out of his coma. Unable to move anything but his right arm slightly, and has enough grip to hold a snack cake. He suffered from shingles before hand as well and it decided to come down his optic nerves so he was blind in one eye and nearly blind in the other. He couldn't afford to do the cornea replacement surgery to regain his eyesight as it would require several months off of work since you can't put any pressure on your head. So now he lays in a bed in an elderly care facility even though he's only in his mid 40's, unable to move, unable to see but still has some cognitive function left. He still understands what's said even if he can't speak very well. I've only seen him once since the incident as I live on the opposite side of the country, and it hurt. The man that worked himself to death to provide for us, that only got addicted to pills because he had destroyed his own body working as hard as he could and needed to keep going. It may sound cold but I truly wish he had passed away. I know how it sounds, but as stated, this was his worst nightmare. Me and him didn't get along too well, we were way too similar and constantly butted heads. However I respected him and his efforts. So please keep in mind fellow humans, that life is fragile and one bad decision can ruin your life. And most importantly, if someone you care about is in a coma and there's a zero percent chance they'll come out unscathed, I implore you to just let them go. Don't be so selfish as to keep them around in agony just because you're weak. Whether you believe in heaven, Valhalla, reincarnation, or something else, anything is better than being a prisoner of your own body.