Distillations magazine

Unexpected Stories from Science’s Past

Politically Charged

How a shady car battery additive called AD‑X2 sparked a showdown between the U.S. political and scientific establishments.

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Distillations articles reveal science’s powerful influence on our lives, past and present.

Illustration of three men whipping, pushing, and pulling a mule with a rope on a road,
Environment & Nature

Mule Power

Unpacking empires and diaspora in Mexico and the United States.

Ilustración de tres hombres azotando, empujando y tirando de una mula con una cuerda en un camino.
Environment & Nature

Mulas de fuerza

Desempacando imperios y diáspora en México y Estados Unidos.

A black and white photograph of a man pointing at the open nose cone of a test rocket in a room with chalkboards on the walls
People & Politics

Ed Pendray and the Science of Tomorrow

A PR man’s pitch for science.

Color photo of a lab-like facility with technicians in lab coats and hairnets standing in front of rows of horseshoe crabs immobilized between wedges of Plexiglas
Health & Medicine

Something Old, Something New

Humans owe a huge medical debt to horseshoe crabs. Now there’s an opportunity to pay it back.

Engraving of a friar working a lab bench while flames and smoke erupt from a pot
Early Science & Alchemy

Holy Smoke

The monks, nuns, and friars at the forefront of alchemy in early modern Europe.

Black and white photo of older man behind a classroom lecturn
Environment & Nature

The Thinking Plant’s Man

Jagadish Chandra Bose and the contentious search for plant intelligence.

Color illustration of a blindfolded flapper holding a crystal ball
People & Politics

Disorderly Persons

What are laws against fortune-telling really meant to do?

Newspaper photo clipping of a woman seated at a table selling book with a sign titled “Gerson Therapy” above
Health & Medicine

Gerson’s Magic Bullet

Why have so many rejected established cancer therapies for juice cocktails and coffee enemas?

Seated woman pouring liquid from a plastic container onto an upturned pot
Inventions & Discoveries

The Ingenious Arctic Cooking Pot

Rediscovering the clever chemistry behind a ceramic tradition that had all but vanished.

Romantic painting of a woman holding French flag on a battlefield with men holding weapons
People & Politics

The Trials of Lavoisier

Tracking the Reign of Terror through a revolutionary chemistry journal.

Older man sitting at a desk stacked with books, a molecular model in the foreground
Health & Medicine

Linus Pauling’s Vitamin C Crusade

The path to a dubious cure.

Black and white illustration of a middle-aged man with beard in academic robes
Inventions & Discoveries

Under Pressure

Walthère Spring and the legacy of a contentious life.

Close up an oil painting showing an eagle’s head
Arts & Culture

Hatching a Legend

Audubon and the Bird of Washington.

Bundled dried sesame in field against deep blue sky
Environment & Nature

Sesame Plots

Diaspora in twenty-one openings.

Fotografía en blanco y negro de un hombre de pie junto a una sección transversal de un árbol enorme
Environment & Nature

Datos ‘proxy’ que hagan justicia

La historia climática de las regiones tropicales ha sido crónicamente poco estudiada. Corregir el rumbo exigirá nuevos métodos y puntos de vista.

Color illustration, strawberries in pattern on a pink background
Inventions & Discoveries

The Ripe Stuff

In pursuit of the perfect fruit.

Old book engraving colored by hand and showing a man with various types of weapons embedded in different parts of his body
Early Science & Alchemy

Of Mummies, Moss, and Magic

A conversation on the weapon salve, a sensational cure.

Color illustration of a museum interior looking down a hall of arched opening showing a large number of objects on display, including an elephant, seashells, antlers, and a kayak
Early Science & Alchemy

Collect Call

In early modern Europe, collecting was a way to press order on a world made increasingly strange.