"A world without chemistry would be one big headache – without the aspirin!"(Science Foundation Ireland, 2011).
Chemistry is defined as, "The scientific study of the basic characteristics of substances and the ways in which they react or combine."(Cambridge University, n.d., p. [Page #]). Chemistry is important to the society we live in in innumerable ways. Chemistry has brought about invaluable advances in the fields of medicine, electromagnetism, radioactivity and many others. The food we eat and the water we drink, on which our lives depend, are manufactured using various chemical processes. Through countless ways, one can observe that chemistry is on the path to solving the most pressing issues of today's world.
1. Modern Medicine:
The rampage of disease and illness has been taking tolls on our society since time immemorial. Before the development of modern chemistry, average life expectancy was only 35. Chemical advancements were the means of overcoming such problems through the provision of medicines to counter ailments such as the bubonic plague and vaccines to prevent measles, small pox, polio and tetanus some of which could cause severe epidemics. Without the contributions of chemistry, minor injuries like cuts and grazes could lead to fatal illnesses and infections and the pain of surgeries and amputations would have to be endured without the local and general anaesthetics of today. Life today is unimaginable without aspirin, the cheap wonder-drug without which there would be no respite from headaches and fever as well as prevention of strokes and heart attacks, another important contribution of chemistry (Science Foundation Ireland, 2011).
2. Food and Water:
Before the advent of modern chemistry, means and techniques of food preservation were extremely limited. It was difficult to gain acess to a stable supply of clean drinking water and fatal water borne diseases like cholera, dysentery and typhoid were common occurences. Chemistry has enabled knowledge of composition of food to grow to a vast extent thereby telling society what is benificial or detrimental to one's health, means of preserving the shelf life of staple foods and provision of ideal nourishment to the body and prevention of afflictions like rickets, osteoporosis and scurvy.
3. Technology:
Chemistry is what enables technological advancements that inspire innovation, create jobs and improve safety in our everyday society. In recent years, the development of nanotechnology has led to the creation of advanced devices, appliances and applications that are capable of raising efficiency of health care, safety, education and environment in many ways. Some of its many uses include application of drugs in specific cells, the reconstruction of damaged tissue and more efficient renewable energy prodution (American Chemistry Council, 2005).
Chemistry can justifiably be dessignated the central science. The connection between the others is established by chemistry and a large proportion of scientific advancement, discoveries and inventions are to some extent dependent on chemistry and for these reasons it can be considered the science that helped develop the modern world into what it is today. Chemistry's impacts surround us at all times and in all places; in the food one consumes in the form of fertilisers amongst others, the water in one's cup of tea through chemical water treatment as well as the semiconductors used in the processors of computers (Walker, 2015, p. [Page #]). Is it so surprising then that chemistry is the science that is considered to get things done?
A day without chemistry
Produced by the American Chemical Society for the International Year of Chemistry (Science Foundation Ireland, 2011).