Ancient Brain Soap!

[TashaBird]

Happy October!!!
Vitrification is the process by which "tissue ... has been burned at high heat and turned into glass or a glaze," according to the New England Journal of Medicine. Although rare to find, cerebral tissues found in archaeological discoveries have saponified, the process by which triglycerides turn into glycerol and fatty acid salts, or soap.
Shocking Pompeii discovery: Experts find evidence of neurons in Vesuvius victim - Big World Tale

 

[Todd Ziegler]

I read that article. It was pretty interesting.

 

[TashaBird]

I read that article. It was pretty interesting.

Fat, ash, water! What a trip! I just hadn’t thought of brains before, but it totally makes sense.

 

[Todd Ziegler]

Fat, ash, water! What a trip! I just hadn’t thought of brains before, but it totally makes sense.

Yes it does but I wouldn't have put it together either.

 

[DLSJR]

As morbid as it sounds I became interested in soap while watching videos on the "Ask A Mortician" YouTube channel. She was talking about people finding saponified corpses. She was talking about the process and everything and it made me really interested in the chemical reactions!