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Q&As since 1989


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Cyanide for aromatherapy

Can you send me a small sample of cyanide. I am studying aromatherapy and want to try out an experiment.

Vithal
student - Wigan, Lancashire, England
2004

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You can get a cyanide aroma from almonds, apricot pits, apple pips, and even lima beans. Perhaps a lab supply store will sell you a small quantity of cyanide, but I certainly hope not. You do realize that this is an instant acting incredibly powerful poison?

Ted Mooney, P.E.
Striving to live Aloha
finishing.com - Pine Beach, New Jersey
2004

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2004

Vithal,

I hope you are joking. If not, then you obviously don't understand the power of cyanide. Very low concentrations (ca 5 ppm) will kill you and anyone else who is unfortunate enough to be associated with your experiment. Handling cyanide is not for people wanting to play games... it DOES kill. If you eat enough pipped apple cores, you can get exposed to enough cyanide to kill you. Try something safer, like primroses.

Trevor Crichton
R&D practical scientist
Chesham, Bucks, UK

I like the taste of apple pips & eat them regularly and I am still alive is it because my body has become resistant/ immune to it?

Desdemona [last name deleted for privacy by Editor]
student - London, England
2005

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July 2013

Hi Desdemona. It's because cyanide is poison but it is not bio accumulative, i.e., it doesn't slowly build up to lethal levels but is washed away in a relatively short period (sorry, I don't know if that period is hours, days, or weeks).

Regards,

Ted Mooney, P.E.
Striving to live Aloha
finishing.com - Pine Beach, New Jersey