Science: Fluorine's Empire

Organic chemistry is about to have a pup, and the pup may grow, theoretically at least, as big as its mother. This week the Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Co. announced that its plant at Hastings, Minn, is turning out a whole litter of "fluorochemicals"—compounds just like ordinary organic chemicals (e.g., acetic acid, ether, etc.), except that they have fluorine in their molecules instead of hydrogen. It should be possible, says Dr. Nelson W. Taylor, manager of Minnesota Mining's fluorochemical department, to make fluorochemical substitutes for all the 100,000-odd organic compounds, from TNT to DDT, that chemists have synthesized so far.

Snug Atoms....

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