[Elfsea] Article: Da Vinci invented plastics too?

David Knebel herault2 at comcast.net
Thu Jun 17 20:41:31 PDT 2004


 
Saw this on another list, thought it might be interesting to some of
you.
 
Tomás

http://www.abc.net.au/science/news/stories/s1038668.htm

Leonardo da Vinci not only anticipated the aeroplane, the life jacket,
the intercom and the robot, he created the first natural plastic,
according to an Italian scholar.

Professor Alessandro Vezzosi, director of the Museo Ideale
<http://www.museoleonardo.it/inglese/start.html>  in the Tuscan town of
Vinci where the artist was born, found Leonardo's recipe for artificial
materials in several pages of drawings and notes. 

Vezzosi studied notes in the da Vinci's Arundel Codex (housed in the
British Library <http://www.bl.uk/>  in London), Forster Codex (in
London at the Victoria and Albert Museum <http://www.vam.ac.uk/> ), the
Atlantic Codex (kept in the Pinacoteca
<http://www.rcs.it/mimu/english/musei/pinacoteca_ambrosiana/presentazion
e.htm>  Ambrosiana in Milan, Italy) and in manuscripts in France.

By reading da Vinci's characteristic "mirror image" handwriting, which
runs from right to left, Vezzosi learned of Leonardo's plastic mixture.

"He combined colours with animal or vegetable glues, sometimes adding
organic fibres," Vezzosi said. 

The Renaissance master obtained effects similar to plastic and
unbreakable glass by "clothing with colours" the leaves of cabbage,
lettuce, paper and ox tripe. 

The materials he coated ranged from "the back of the stomach of a heifer
or a ox", "the leaves of wrinkle lettuce", "papers and little canes used
as goose pens" and a "large Milanese wrinkled leaf of cabbage, which
should be collected in December or January". 

Vezzosi followed Leonardo's instructions and applied colours mixed with
vegetable or animal glues. He then painted the materials described by
Leonardo with many layers. As the first material dried, he removed it
and obtained a material similar to bakelite, a plastic from the early
1900s. 

"You have to be patient and wait until each layer of colour dries
completely. We used pigments similar to those applied by Leonardo. They
ranged from traditional oil paint to any kind of organic materials,"
Vezzosi said. 

The successful reproduction of Leonardo's natural polychrome plastic
proved that the Florentine genius created the first man-made plastic
long before Alexander Parkes invented parkesine (an organic material
derived from cellulose) in 1862 and Leo Hendrik Baekeland's bakelite in
1909. 

"Leonardo created a material somewhere between natural and chemical
plastic. Indeed, he had already synthesised a chemical very similar to
acetone. But in his experiments he always used non-toxic, organic
substances," Vezzosi said. 

Leonardo's polychrome mixtures were so similar to phenolic resin that
they could be used to create knife handles, salt cellars, containers and
necklaces. His monochrome mixtures could be used to create cups or vases
that "once thrown on the floor don't break". 

Professor Alessandro Bagno, from the University
<http://www.unipd.it/en/index.htm>  of Padova's department of organic
chemistry, said it was interesting that da Vinci used layers to create
unbreakable objects.

"In the case of oil painting, for example, linseed oil is the binding
agent. This oil polymerises slowly on contact with the air, forming a
resistant, waterproof polymer similar to linoleum. 

"This shows once again Leonardo's great innovative input, although
obviously it doesn't add anything to our knowledge nowadays." 




Alastair

http://www.lionsgoblet.com/

               ,  ,, ,
         , ,; ; ;;  ; ;  ;
      , ; ';  ;  ;; .-''\ ; ;
   , ;  ;`  ; ,; . / /8b \ ; ;
   `; ; .;'         ;,\8 |  ;  ;
   ` ;/   / `_      ; ;;    ;  ; ;
       |/.'  /9)    ;  ; `    ;  ; ;
     ,/'          ; ; ;  ;   ; ; ; ;
    /_            ;    ;  `    ;  ;
    `?8P"  .      ;  ; ; ; ;     ;  ;;
    | ;  .:: `     ;; ; ;   `  ;  ;
     `' `--._      ;;  ;;  ; ;   ;   ;
      `-..__..--''   ; ;    ;;   ; ;   ;
                ;    ; ; ;   ;     ; 



Yahoo! Groups Sponsor


ADVERTISEMENT
 
<http://us.ard.yahoo.com/SIG=1292k0mjc/M=298184.5022502.6152625.3001176/
D=groups/S=1705152340:HM/EXP=1087596924/A=2164339/R=0/SIG=11e2d64in/*htt
p:/www.netflix.com/Default?mqso=60183348> click here

 
<http://us.adserver.yahoo.com/l?M=298184.5022502.6152625.3001176/D=group
s/S=:HM/A=2164339/rand=396333292> 
 
  _____  

Yahoo! Groups Links
*	To visit your group on the web, go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SCA-Squires/
  
*	To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:
SCA-Squires-unsubscribe at yahoogroups.com
<mailto:SCA-Squires-unsubscribe at yahoogroups.com?subject=Unsubscribe> 
  
*	Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of
Service <http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/> . 
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.ansteorra.org/pipermail/elfsea-ansteorra.org/attachments/20040617/dfa6e1f2/attachment-0006.htm>


More information about the Elfsea mailing list