episode_0078

Episode 78. Goldfish (1)

****

Although it was a bit difficult, the ward rounds were well concluded. Amy put the medical records back in the brown envelope.

“What is the patient’s impression?”

“It’s still difficult. Professor, can you tell what kind of disease a patient has just by looking at their face?”

well.

Sir Arthur, who wrote the Sherlock Holmes series, was a doctor. It has been said that he wrote Sherlock’s detective process after being inspired by the process of observing patients and inferring information about them.

Of course, in modern times, there is no need to go that far. With the advancement of examination, there is no need to rely solely on the observer’s flash of inspiration to make a diagnosis. But things are different now.

“Inference is important. For example, let’s take Joseph from earlier. You could tell that he was a person who worked with dirt by looking at his fingernails. And the fact that there was dirt on his fingernails means that he was like that until recently. Isn’t that a disease that can be contracted if you do outdoor activities such as touching dirt in the fall? Ticks.”

Amy nodded with a slightly depressed expression. Was the explanation too complicated?

“I see… … .”

“You can ask.”

Still, it’s a good idea to try to get as much information as possible. Not all patients will be kind enough to answer, and many won’t tell you what’s important because they don’t know what to tell you.

There are also often unconscious patients.

“Then, Professor, before you saw Mr. Joseph, you had an idea of what kind of illness he had? And what symptoms should you be careful of?”

“Yeah.”

“There’s nothing easy… … .”

“You’ll understand as you study. First of all, what we can learn from this patient is that the types of patients that come are different each season. And late summer is the tick season.”

“Yep.”

Amy nodded.

“I’ll give you the medicine. If Mr. Joseph finds a tick or tick bite, give him these to take two a day.”

“Okay, I see. What if you can’t find it?”

“I’ll give it to you anyway.”

I should go back to the lab. I’m sure there’s a pile of letters there from the Whitby Society.

I’ve heard that modern scholars frequently exchanged letters, but I’m not sure.

I didn’t know that they would come in bulk, without any countermeasures, like malicious fan mail. Did great seniors like Pasteur and Lister have similar experiences?

Could it have been worse?

****

Anyway, I saw some of the patients who had piled up. I returned to the lab with light steps. Istina was in the lab, wrapping her hair.

“What are you doing?”

“Antibiotic purification process.”

“Is it difficult?”

“Is there a way to do this?”

Well, I don’t know if alchemy will work, but I’ve been thinking about it for the past few days. How to purify penicillin.

I came up with my own answer, but I don’t know if Istina or Luciana could have come up with an answer of their own.

“Professor.”

“Yeah.”

“Even if you filter the blue mold culture solution through a sieve, the medicinal ingredients will still pass through, right?”

“I guess so.”

It depends on the size of the filter. If you use activated carbon or a cloth filter, the penicillin with a large molecular weight may be absorbed as it is. The holes should be large enough to be visible to the eye.

Isn’t it? Since it’s water-soluble anyway, it might be okay to filter it through a cloth.

“You can’t boil it, right?”

“Penicillin is not completely broken down when boiled.”

There must be a way. Even if it’s not barium, there must be a way to precipitate penicillin or make a precipitate in this world. Let’s try it.

I looked at the bottles of medicine that Istina had procured from somewhere. I had no choice but to examine them one by one. What should I do first?

Acetic acid is required. Acetic acid has a sour smell, and phenylacetic acid has a sweet smell… … .

It turns out that chemists don’t just try this stuff. Now that I’m in a situation where I have to identify drugs and determine their properties, I think I should try it too.

That’s why Newton’s hair contained 15 times the normal amount of arsenic. I couldn’t eat it myself, so I looked at Istina.

“Istina. Among these bottles, which medicine smells like sweet vinegar?”

“They say chemists live short lives.”

“Um… ….”

Istina very carefully picked up one of the bottles and smelled it.

“Isn’t this it?”

“Look.”

I sniffed the medicine Istina gave me. It definitely smelled sweet.

“What is this?”

“It’s purified acetic acid.”

“Okay.”

I have struggled a lot with my lack of chemistry skills.

The plan I made was something like this.

If you make a buffer solution with acetic acid and add ammonium sulfate, the acidity will stabilize in a slightly acidic state. If you mix well in this state, an ammonium-penicillin precipitate may precipitate.

Maybe. I don’t know. I’ll just give it a try.

“There’s sulfuric acid, right?”

“Yes.”

“What is ammonium?”

“Ah, this is it. A really unpleasant smelling drug that is mixed in as fertilizer raw material.”

“Give me.”

This one, though, honestly said on the bottle that it was sulfur fertilizer. Saved me the trouble. It’s hard to tell if there’s ammonium just by smell, but it seemed like there might be.

It’s true that ammonium is used as fertilizer. I had my doubts about whether it was used as fertilizer because it smelled similar to poop…

ha.

It’s disturbing to sit around smelling like a madman, but these guys didn’t write down the molecular formula. What else is there?

“Now let’s mix it.”

Istina nodded, then looked at me as if she was pondering something.

“But how do you evaluate how to mix what? It seems like it would be difficult to determine the amount.”

“No. You can make a buffer solution with acetic acid and slowly add ammonium sulfate. Then you can control the acidity change.”

“If that’s the case, why did you leave it to the pension department? The professor seems to know much better.”

I took the largest glass beaker in the lab and filled it with water.

“Just take a look.”

“What are you going to do with this?”

As I said, I thought about it a lot. The pH needed is around 6 to 5. But in this day and age, there is no equipment to accurately measure pH. There is not even yellow litmus paper.

In my limited opinion, there is only one solution.

I took out a fishbowl from behind my desk. There was a small goldfish in the fishbowl.

“It will be a noble sacrifice.”

“No way.”

This is the most perfect and simple acid-base tester. You will slowly add acetic acid and acetic acid powder to the water you put your goldfish in.

“Look. We’re going to slowly add the acid powder. The moment the goldfish dies, that’s when we have to stop adding it.”

The goldfish will die the moment the acidity of the solution goes beyond the neutral range. Then, you can say that you have successfully created a weakly acidic solution. You can just add penicillin to it.

“That’s terrible.”

“Animal testing is often done, right?”

Istina looked at me with a bewildered expression. Perhaps a look of pity.

“It’s a bit… … . horrible that you thought of a goldfish as a tool to measure the properties of a solution.”

“Because there is no other way.”

Well, it’s a sacrifice of cattle for the sake of the generation.

We put the goldfish in the buffer solution we had prepared. The goldfish did not die immediately. I slowly added a few drops of the ammonium sulfate solution to the glass beaker containing the goldfish.

And. The goldfish died. Istina caught the goldfish that had floated to the surface with her gloved hands.

I stopped administering ammonium sulfate and added the previously filtered blue mold culture. After a few minutes, a white precipitate collected at the bottom of the beaker.

“Wow… … . I’m just speechless.”

“That’s right, it’s so amazing.”

“Is that white powder on the bottom of the beaker penicillin? Can I make medicine with it?”

I nodded.

The thing that has accumulated at the bottom of the beaker is probably penicillin. Since penicillin has a large molecular weight, the precipitate will precipitate quickly and be visible. I don’t know that much because I’m not a chemistry major.

“What do you think?”

“Professor. But… … . Even if I explain this to someone, I don’t think anyone will be able to understand and follow this process.”

“Why? You understood it too.”

“From what I understand, you received the medicine through a magic ritual of sacrificing a goldfish. Is that right?”

How could that be?

“No. The moment the goldfish dies is the moment when the acetic acid buffer solution changes from a neutral solution to a slightly acidic solution. That’s why I put the goldfish in and administered ammonium sulfate.”

“So. Isn’t that black magic?”

I sighed.

It doesn’t seem like it’ll work out as planned. Istina isn’t stupid, but even if we leave it to the people of this era… … The day when penicillin is mass-produced may never come.

I think we need to rethink our plans.

“Anyway, I proved that it is possible.”

“Right.”

Istina nodded. Looking at the goldfish corpse discarded on one side of the workbench. There was a slight awe in Istina’s eyes. A look that seemed to be looking at something incomprehensible.

“Still, it’s amazing! Let’s extract it and see if it can be used as medicine.”

That’s right.

Istina left the dead goldfish behind and returned to her workbench with her dropper.