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Author: Subject: Most toxic compound OTC?
Refinery
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[*] posted on 23-5-2020 at 10:26
Most toxic compound OTC?


Just came up in my mind, what would be the most toxic compound that a common person can buy in any reasonable quantity without any special requirements?

By toxicity I mean either low LD50 or chronic toxicity that will lead to serious harm to health.
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njl
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[*] posted on 23-5-2020 at 10:34


Many insecticides, radioisotopes, alkaloids, and commodity chemicals. Sodium isocyanate (pool chemical) can be reduced with carbon to sodium cyanide etc.
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UC235
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[*] posted on 23-5-2020 at 10:45


Rodent poisons, probably. Superwarfarins like brodifacoum. 9mo half life in the body, the antidote is almost constant Vitamin K intake until it's been eliminated. Granted, it's not sold pure, but highly diluted into baits, but still.
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mackolol
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[*] posted on 23-5-2020 at 10:46


Lithium salts along with some psychedelic lets say... morning glory seeds. This would be pretty tough shittt
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TheMrbunGee
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[*] posted on 23-5-2020 at 11:10


Nicotine.. LD50 of 127 mg/kg when administered to mice. And now when vaping is so common, It is quite easy to get. But I have hear that the lethal dose may be higher, than given.



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B(a)P
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[*] posted on 23-5-2020 at 12:37


Botulinum toxin, not that you can get them OTC, but you can get them injected into your face. LD50 5 ng/kg of body weight.
Bitumen contains benzo(a)pyrene it has an LD50 of 50 mg/kg of body weight. However, 50 ug/kg of body weight is tumour inducing.
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clearly_not_atara
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[*] posted on 23-5-2020 at 13:58


Without additional chemical modification, I think the answer is probably the americium-241 used in smoke detectors.

A typical smoke detector contains 0.29 micrograms of 241Am with an activity of 1 microcurie and a decay energy of 7.5 MeV. The decay energy of 210Po for comparison is 5.4 MeV but the activity per gram is much higher.

The toxicity of radioactive substances can be roughly characterized by giving the dose in curies (activity) rather than in grams. The half-life of 210Po is about 1160 times as long as the half-life of 241Am so we expect the lethal dose to be that much higher. The lethal dose of 210Po is about 1 microgram so our estimate for the lethal dose of 241Am is about 1.2 mg, which is the amount of radioactive material in 4000 smoke detectors.




[Edited on 04-20-1969 by clearly_not_atara]
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TheMrbunGee
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[*] posted on 23-5-2020 at 14:00


Quote: Originally posted by B(a)P  
Botulinum toxin, not that you can get them OTC, but you can get them injected into your face. LD50 5 ng/kg of body weight.


I gave botox a little research, seems like a vial of botox "filler" has 100 "units" which correlates to LD50 for 100 mice. About 5ng of toxin in the vial, and they charge 10-15 united dollars of America per "unit", so it will cost about 90 000 of these dollars to get a lethal dose. :D

Source


You can also get thallium compounds off ebay.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Thallium-Bromoiodide-Window-KRS5-1-...

[Edited on 23-5-2020 by TheMrbunGee]




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B(a)P
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[*] posted on 23-5-2020 at 14:16


Looks like it might also be in the running for most expensive toxin.:P
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Fulmen
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[*] posted on 23-5-2020 at 14:43


Why not look at this in terms of total effect? As in the largest number of "lethal doses" one could amass without detection?



We're not banging rocks together here. We know how to put a man back together.
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G-Coupled
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[*] posted on 23-5-2020 at 19:02


Quote: Originally posted by TheMrbunGee  
Nicotine.. LD50 of 127 mg/kg when administered to mice. And now when vaping is so common, It is quite easy to get. But I have hear that the lethal dose may be higher, than given.


It would appear that the LD50 in humans for Nicotine is actually quite a bit higher than has been thought for many years.

Apparently, Nicotine's 'massive toxicity' was based on some rather sketchy experiments in the 1800s, and more modern studies have shown it's nowhere near as lethal as was thought. :cool:
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[*] posted on 23-5-2020 at 19:44


Quote: Originally posted by Fulmen  
Why not look at this in terms of total effect? As in the largest number of "lethal doses" one could amass without detection?

That's the problem with this kind of discussion. It is very hard to compare like with like.
I bet I could do a short car trip around a few hardware stores and pool suppliers in my area and end up with a couple of hundred kg of calcium hypochlorite: and not raise any eyebrows - at least not immediately. Without looking it up that should be sufficient to kill a lot of people. The difficulty would be in getting them to ingest it. Does that make it more or less toxic than smoke detector tea?
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[*] posted on 23-5-2020 at 21:12


Amatoxins are pretty strong and deadly
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[*] posted on 23-5-2020 at 23:05


One can buy castor beans quite easily
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[*] posted on 23-5-2020 at 23:24


Quote: Originally posted by TheMrbunGee  


I gave botox a little research, seems like a vial of botox "filler" has 100 "units" which correlates to LD50 for 100 mice. About 5ng of toxin in the vial, and they charge 10-15 united dollars of America per "unit", so it will cost about 90 000 of these dollars to get a lethal dose. :D


Holy shit. My dad used to do quality control for a company that produced botox. One day he brought home a whole box of vials to show us, just for the shits and giggles. He had been tasked with poking holes into each and every one of them in order to measure the pressure and composition of the gas inside. Must've been 200 vials. The contents of that box was probably worth more than our house before he poked em all full of holes O_O

[Edited on 2020-5-24 by dawt]
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[*] posted on 24-5-2020 at 00:18


I'm growing Aconitum, Ricinus, Conium and Datura spp. right now. All seeds were OTC, only the Aconitum seeds I bought didn't germinate, so I bought it as a plant at the garden centre.

I'm planning to extract all the toxins, except for the ricin, I will just put a couple of beans on display.

Edit: I harvested some Heracleum spp. from next to the channel 500 meters from my place. This is the one I'm a bit afraid of... As the furanocoumarins are contract poisons, at least in combination with UVA.

[Edited on 24-5-2020 by Tsjerk]
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karlosĀ³
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[*] posted on 24-5-2020 at 00:48


Yeah ricinus trees are very beautiful.
And the datura are hard to get rid off once they made theirself a home in the garden... they show up in spots nobody would've expected them!
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[*] posted on 24-5-2020 at 01:40


I read about the Datura being stubborn indeed, therefore they are a pot on my roof terras, no chance for them to grow anywhere there. Ricinus is very nice I have the communis var. 'Carmencitas Bright Red'.
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[*] posted on 24-5-2020 at 03:07


Quote: Originally posted by Tsjerk  

Edit: I harvested some Heracleum spp. from next to the channel 500 meters from my place. This is the one I'm a bit afraid of... As the furanocoumarins are contract poisons, at least in combination with UVA.

[Edited on 24-5-2020 by Tsjerk]


Are you kidding? This plant is super invasive and very dangerous. And it is illegal to plant it. I really doubt if you would operate with whis plant safely. I have Heracleum "infected" field not far from my house and it is very tough and stubborn to kill plant. It also grows and spreads everywhere like crazy.
Better make some furanocoumarins in lab
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[*] posted on 24-5-2020 at 04:34


Ricin got a mention so...
"Symptoms are identical to those of ricin, except abrin is more toxic by almost two orders of magnitude; the fatal dose of abrin is approximately 1/75 that of the fatal dose of ricin"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abrus_precatorius
is occasionally OTC when somebody fails to stop it.
https://www.torfaen.gov.uk/en/News/2012/March/20-Deadly-seed...
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[*] posted on 24-5-2020 at 04:37


These heracleum bastard plants, giant hogweeds have spread all over here and they have been warned on the national news level.
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[*] posted on 24-5-2020 at 06:59


The Heracleum I'm not growing, I harvested it and dried the plant material to isolate the furanocoumarins from. The city government apparently doesn't really put a lot of effort into eradicating the plants here. The are growing in the middle of the city in places with a lot of playing kids around.
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[*] posted on 24-5-2020 at 17:46



Heroin is extremely toxic particularly if you are not used to it. It's not exactly over the counter but if you were to ask the low life drug dealer to stand the far side of a counter when they are selling it to you it is.

Yob
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[*] posted on 25-5-2020 at 00:07


here in italy you can find oleander plants in every corner of every city, they are hardy plants, and have nice flowers. i could fill my home with leaves before anyone would ever notice.




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[*] posted on 25-5-2020 at 03:23


Quote: Originally posted by Tsjerk  
The Heracleum I'm not growing, I harvested it and dried the plant material to isolate the furanocoumarins from. The city government apparently doesn't really put a lot of effort into eradicating the plants here. The are growing in the middle of the city in places with a lot of playing kids around.


Good to read this. This plant grows everywhere all over Europe or am I mistaken ?
I have probably litterally mowed fields of them as a kid with a stick.


To go back to the topic, you all seem to have a different meaning for "OTC" and the notion depends on where you are in the world. Also, OTC means a much different thing for us than for non chemist who are not interested in what's really in the bottle.

Though it's not as toxic as other OTC products I'd go for bleach.
Not for itself but for the potential it has to be toxic when mixed with... well, just about any other OTC chemical products.




The spirit of adventure was upon me. Having nitric acid and copper, I had only to learn what the words 'act upon' meant. - Ira Remsen
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