Washington – Many inventions have resulted from accidental discoveries. Here are a few of the most amazing products and gadgets, which would otherwise not have seen the light of day.
* In 1931, Charles Getz was a student at the University of Illinois working in the dairy bacteriology department to make extra money. One of his projects was to find a better way to sterilise, or destroy germs in, milk. Getz thought he might be able to achieve that goal by using pressurised gas. But instead of sterilising milk, the gas whipped it. Getz knew from his days working in an ice-cream shop that it took a long time to whip cream. After replacing milk with cream and finding the right gas to use (nitrous oxide had no smell or taste), he invented Instant Whip – whipped cream in a can.
* Spencer Silver, a chemist at the 3M company, set out in 1968 to create a super-strong glue. Instead, he produced a weak adhesive.
Silver couldn’t find a use for it, but years later, co-worker Arthur Fry used it to lightly attach a note to a report. Post-It Notes were born. They appeared on store shelves in 1980.
* Scottish biochemist Alexander Fleming discovered Penicilin in 1928. When he returned from a holiday, he noticed that many of his petri dishes (small plates used to grow germs) had become contaminated with a fungus, and he threw them in the rubbish. When he retrieved the plates to show a visitor what he’d been working on, Fleming noticed an area around the fungus where no bacteria were growing. He theorised that the fungus produced a chemical that was dangerous to bacteria. Fleming named the substance penicillin because it came from a fungus known as Penicillium. Eighty years on, antibiotics based on penicillin are still among the most popular drugs used in the world.
* In the first half of the 20th century, coal was used to heat homes. Because coal didn’t burn completely, it left a sooty film on the wallpaper that adorned many homes in the US.
Noah McVicker, who worked at a soap company in Ohio, created a non-staining, doughy substance to clean soot from wallpaper. Demand for the product fell dramatically after World War II as coal was replaced by natural gas, which didn’t leave a mess on walls. McVicker’s nephew saved the company from bankruptcy when he learned that children in nursery schools were using the cleaner for arts-and-crafts projects. The company reworked the compound, added colour and Play-doh was born.
The Washington Post