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Colchicine is a highly poisonous alkaloid originally extracted from a type of saffron plant that is used mainly to treat gout.
In ancient Rome, many of the richer people in the population had lead-induced gout. The reason for this is unclear. Lead poisoning has also been linked to madness.
To prove that stomach ulcers were caused by bacteria and not by stress, a researcher consumed an entire laboratory beaker full of bacterial culture. After this, he did indeed develop stomach ulcers, and won the Nobel Prize for his discovery.
Atropine, along with scopolamine and hyoscyamine, is found in the Datura stramonium plant, which gives hallucinogenic effects and is also known as locoweed.
Your skin wrinkles if you stay in the bathtub a long time because the outermost layer of skin (which consists of dead keratin) swells when it absorbs water. It is tightly attached to the skin below it, so it compensates for the increased area by wrinkling. This happens to the hands and feet because they have the thickest layer of dead keratin cells.
![Changes in boreal forest composition along a chronosequence in Quebec. Dates refer to the year of th](https://biology-forums.com/gallery/47/medium_33_17_02_12_6_53_46_20121657.jpeg)
![The nitrogen cycle. Numbers represent fluxes as 1012 g N per year (data from Schlesinger 1991, after](https://biology-forums.com/gallery/47/medium_33_17_02_12_7_02_17_2038129.jpeg)