Rubbing an E-number found in the orange food dye used in Doritos, the tortilla snack, can turn the skin invisible, scientists have found.
A chemical called tartrazine, also known as FD&C Yellow #5 and as the E number E102, was mixed with water and rubbed on the shaved stomach and scalp of lab mice. Moments later, the skin was transparent.
Eh?
The Doritos E-number changed skin transparency because it absorbs lots of blue light and when this is mixed with a liquid layer found naturally in the skin, known as the extracellular matrix, it increases the refractive index to an almost-perfect match for the skin cells and other components of the skin.
This then allows light to pass through all parts of the skin without being bounced around, the scientists found, leading to transparency.
Dr Ou explained: “We combined the yellow dye, which is a molecule that absorbs most light, especially blue and ultraviolet light, with skin, which is a scattering medium.
“Individually, these two things block most light from getting through them. But when we put them together, we were able to achieve transparency of the mouse skin.
No, no, well above my science grade.
Well I never, eh?
Tartrazine has been around for a very long time, shirley ?
Have they only just now discoverec this ?
Anyway sounds like a laugh. Is it safe to bathe in ?
If this is true how come Scouse women aren’t invisible?
Interested
That one did genuinely make me LOL
Over breakfast….
I would presume it’s like putting oil on paper. It changes the refractive index of cellulose fibres so it becomes transparent.
Long ago it was used for instead of glass. Found a window like this inside a wall when helping a mate renovate his house. Bits of which date back before the Conquest (re-used timbers).* Wood frame with parchment set in it. One could even see writing on the parchment from its previous use.
*Houses like this have been there a very long time. But they’re a bit like Paddy’s shovel. The blade’s been changed a few times & so has the shaft. But it’s still the same shovel. He always used the same nail to attach one to t’other. The bricks comprised the central chimney looked like Tudor era. But you can bet they were re-use.
The choice is yours: rub your skin with them and eat loads of them, and you become invisible so you can shoplift, touch attractive strangers, and follow your neighbour into their home. Or just rub your skin with them, and you can freak people out with a “walking anatomical model” routine.
Have they started work on Cheesy Wotsits yet?
I thought tartrazine was the all-purpose instant cancer-inducing death-potion from old orange squashes. It probably started the E-numbers scare from those best forgotten times.
That parchment might well be animal hide rather than paper made from wood pulp as we understand it. Stretched thinly over a frame and dried, it will be slightly translucent. And could well have been used for writing on previously. Until very recently (as in, 2015), UK laws were all scribed onto vellum as that is better for archiving than paper: https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7451/
I wondered that, BiW. But it was old, didn’t want to touch it. What of the writing could be seen, the letters were very close together. So possibly medieval. And it’s still there in a wall, untouched. The original wall must have been exterior, became interior when something was built on. So we just boarded over the original studs & it’ll be there until the next person takes the house to pieces. 2300?
Well, if real, it could make a phlebotomist’s job a lot easier, and much to the relief of pin cushioned patients everywhere. Of course, it’ll never be licensed for such use, tartrazine is out of fashion these days and there’ll be no patent on it, so little money to make and the clinical efficacy and safety data to support a licence application either as a medicine or medical device will be prohibitive.