Paul Ehrlich dreamed of a treatment that strikes disease and spares the patient, and in 1910 his laboratory delivered Salvarsan, an arsenic drug aimed at the syphilis organism. It worked, but it was toxic, hard to give, and fiercely contested. The episode traces his idea to the 2026 Nobel Prize for optogenetics and sets out five instruments of control: knife, current, molecule, gene and light.
Who's who
- Paul Ehrlich+3 more episodesGerman physician who founded chemotherapy and coined the magic bullet idea
- Sahachiro Hata+1 more episodeJapanese bacteriologist who found compound 606 cured syphilis in rabbits
- Alfred BertheimChemist who synthesized compound 606 in 1907
- Robert Koch+4 more episodesBacteriologist whose institute Ehrlich joined
- Emil von Behring+1 more episodeDeveloper of diphtheria antitoxin
- Karl Deisseroth+3 more episodesStanford psychiatrist and bioengineer; 2026 Nobel laureate
- Peter Hegemann+1 more episodeBerlin biophysicist; 2026 Nobel laureate
- Georg Nagel+1 more episodeWürzburg biophysicist; 2026 Nobel laureate
Where it happens
- Frankfurt, Germany+2 more episodesSite of Ehrlich's institute and the Georg-Speyer-Haus
- Wiesbaden, GermanyWhere compound 606 was presented in April 1910
Timeline
- 1908Ehrlich shares the Nobel Prize with Ilya Mechnikov
- 1909Hata finds compound 606 cures syphilis in rabbits
- April 19, 1910Ehrlich and Hata present compound 606 at Wiesbaden
- December 1910Hoechst puts Salvarsan on the market
- August 2005Millisecond optical control of neurons published
- October 5, 2026Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine goes to optogenetics
Still debated
Sources disagree on what the number 606 means, on the date of the lectures where Ehrlich spoke of magic bullets, and on how dangerous Salvarsan really was. Defenders blamed deaths on faulty preparation; critics blamed the drug.
Connected episodes in other series
Syphilis: The Shadow on the Land (1906–2026)The U.S. Public Health Service · Episode 27Also features Paul Ehrlich, Sahachiro Hata
The Disease We Thought We'd BeatenThe White Plague Returns · Episode 1Also features Robert Koch
Does Abundance Free Us — or Just Reinvent Inequality?What Abundance Built · Episode 7Also features Paul Ehrlich