Isaac Newton, like Albert Einstein, is a quintessential symbol of the human intellect and its ability to decode the secrets of nature. Newton's fundamental contributions to science include the quantification of gravitational attraction, the discovery that white light is actually a mixture of immutable spectral colors, and the formulation of the calculus. Yet there is another, more mysterious side to Newton that is imperfectly known, a realm of activity that spanned some thirty years of his life, although he kept it largely hidden from his contemporaries and colleagues. We refer to Newton's involvement in the discipline of alchemy, or as it was often called in seventeenth-century England, "chymistry."

Examples of science & technology webcasts include:

• Got Game
• Chemical Warfare from WWI to Al-Qaeda
• Dawn of the Space Age
• Science, Ethics and the Law
• Cutting Edge Research

(Originally highlighted by The Scout Report, January 27, 2006 - Volume 12, Number 4)

[About CHF]

The Chemical Heritage Foundation (CHF) serves the community of the chemical and molecular sciences, and the wider public, by treasuring the past, educating the present, and inspiring the future. CHF maintains a world-class collection of materials that document the history and heritage of the chemical and molecular sciences, technologies, and industries; encourages research in CHF collections; and carries out a program of outreach and interpretation in order to advance an understanding of the role of the chemical and molecular sciences, technologies, and industries in shaping society.

The Los Alamos reports were archived by researchers Carey Sublette and Gregory Walker. Over the past year FAS has added more and more of the collection, which comprises an enormous 8.5 gigabytes of data, to the website.

Many of the documents have enduring if narrow scientific value, judging from the requests we regularly receive for various titles. Others are principally of historical value. Still others hold both scientific and historical interest.

For example, the 1947 study entitled "Blast Wave" (LA-2000, a 19 MB PDF file) includes original scientific papers by Hans Bethe, John von Neuman and Rudolph Peierls -- but also by Klaus Fuchs, who would be convicted in 1950 of spying for the Soviet Union.

[About Federation of American Scientists]

The Federation of American Scientists (FAS) was formed in 1945 by atomic scientists from the Manhattan Project. Endorsed by nearly 60 Nobel Laureates in biology, chemistry, economics, medicine and physics as sponsors, the Federation has addressed a broad spectrum of national security issues of the nuclear age in carrying out its mission to promote humanitarian uses of science and technology.

Albert Imre Szent-Gyorgyi (1893-1986), a Hungarian-born biochemist, was the first to isolate vitamin C, and his research on biological oxidation provided the basis for Krebs' citric acid cycle. His discoveries about the biochemical nature of muscular contraction revolutionized the field of muscle research. His later career was devoted to research in "submolecular" biology, applying quantum physics to biological processes. He was especially interested in cancer, and was one of the first to explore the connections between free radicals and cancer. Szent-Gyorgyi won the 1937 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his work in biological oxidation and vitamin C, and the Lasker Award in Basic Medical Research in 1954, for contributions to understanding cardiovascular disease through basic muscle research.

The National Library of Medicine (NLM) is making the archival collections of leaders in biomedical research and public health available on its Profiles in Science® web site. The site, launched in September 1998, promotes the use of the Internet for research and teaching in the history of biomedical science. Many of the collections have been donated to NLM and contain published and unpublished items, including books, journal volumes, pamphlets, diaries, letters, manuscripts, photographs, audiotapes, video clips, and other materials.