In Equatorial Africa and South America grows a small plant whose sap, until recently, carried only death. By the way, in these countries one could easily buy curare venom. The natives impregnated small arrows with the juice. The animal struck by such an arrow died after a brief stupor. The victim was exposed to curare poison.
Nowadays the deadly sap of the plant is widely used in medicine during surgeries. A certain dose of it paralyzes the muscles and thus facilitates the surgeon's work. When the poison is injected into the body there is as if disconnection, disconnection of the nervous system and muscles, which have the ability to contract involuntarily. But the formation of the precious poison requires an abundance of sunlight.
Only in the South can a powerful stream of light lavish the capricious plant with warmth and color. Yes, exactly color, because the formation of poison occurs in a certain color spectrum. There are no such conditions in northern countries, and the plant cannot live there.
Today, scientists are synthesizing similar substances that are in no way inferior in their properties to the sap of a stingy southern plant. The synthesis takes place under the influence of strong light rays, the efficiency of which is almost a thousand times greater than the light bulbs in our apartments. The joint work of pharmacologists and light engineers has been a success. Not only was it possible to synthesize under the influence of an artificial light source, but even to create a new drug. On the basis of the resulting substance, many drugs have been made that differ in their duration of action.
In recent years there has been a fierce fight against influenza epidemics, but so far no synthetic substance has been found that can kill the fierce viruses. The fact is that the insidious virus is also improving and adapting. And each of them requires a special vaccine. We need a universal remedy, on the creation of which medics and chemists are now working.
Scientists have succeeded in obtaining one interesting substance. It happened like this. One day there was a congress of chemists. On the emblem of the congress, the original structural formula of a substance that nobody had ever seen before was unintentionally depicted. A year later the newspapers reported that American scientists had succeeded in producing this substance by photosynthesis. It was named "Congressman," in honor of Congress.
Currently, curare venom is used as a medical drug, but purchase curare venom is not freely available.