The oldest examples of aspirin were found on papyrus in ancient Egypt and in clay tablets in ancient Sumeria. These described medicines based on willow bark extract and salicylate-rich plants. Western medicine also used these medicines to reduce fever around 400 BC, used by Hippocrates. It was first explicitly noticed by the world in 1971 because of Sir John Vane. Aspirin made its mark in history for the second time relatively recently. It accompanied astronauts to the Moon and was cited in the "Guinness Book of Records" and the 20th century was even defined as the "age of aspirin" by the Spanish philosopher José Ortega y Gasset. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay In 1971, Sir John Vane, then working at the Royal College of Surgeons of England, discovered the mode of action of aspirin and related compounds, known as NSAIDs (nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs). This achievement ultimately earned Sir John Vane, originally just John Vane, both the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for 1982 and a knighthood, as this demonstrated him as a nobleman. The drugs, he found, inhibit the growth process of prostaglandins. Aspirin and most other NSAIDs, nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, reject the synthesis of cyclooxygenase enzymes, which normally activate the production of prostaglandins. Prostaglandins have a wide variety of effects, acting as molecules that send information to various places to make the process The body initiates an inflammatory process and is involved in sending pain information to the brain and regulating core temperature. Their suppression explains the analgesic (pain relief), anti-inflammatory and antipyretic effects that make NSAIDs so usable. NSAIDs also thin the blood and slow clot formation through a similar mechanism, which is why aspirin has recently taken on a significant new role in the prevention and treatment of heart attacks and strokes. NSAIDs can have serious side effects when taken regularly or in high doses, especially gastrointestinal symptoms, including stomach ulcers and bleeding. Not only do acidic molecules irritate the gastrointestinal tract, but cyclooxygenase enzymes are found in abundance in the stomach lining, where the prostaglandins they release play a protective role for the stomach lining. Aspirin has also been linked to Reye's syndrome, a deadly disease associated with viral infections, which is why aspirin is no longer used to treat flu-like symptoms in children. Since the development of aspirin in the late 19th century, a number of other NSAIDs have flooded the market, including the common prescription-over-the-counter drug ibuprofen. Paracetamol, or acetaminophen, closely related in structure to aspirin, has also become very popular as a pain reliever, in part because it causes little irritation to the stomach lining. But although scientists have found that acetaminophen also affects cyclooxygenase enzymes, it is not strictly an NSAID: it works differently and has no anti-inflammatory or clotting-reducing properties. Aspirin's new role in circulatory health has solidified its place as one of the most popular medications in the world. Studies have also hinted at additional preventative uses of aspirin, although they have yet to be adequately documented. It's been a strange journey for this wonder drug. People have been using salicylic acid, found naturally in willow and myrtle, almost as long as civilization has existed. Ancient tablets ofSumerian clay mention the use of willow leaves to treat rheumatoid arthritis, and the Ebers Papyrus, one of the oldest preserved medical texts in the world, indicates that Egyptians knew about the analgesic properties of dried myrtle leaves since at least the mid-second century. millennium BC The Greek physician Hippocrates wrote in the 5th century BC of the healing powers of willow bark, sentiments later echoed by Galen and other Roman and Greek luminaries, and some evidence also suggests that ancient Chinese, Native American and African groups were aware of the drug. NEW MARKETS Bayer obtained a U.S. patent for acetylsalicylic acid, aspirin, in 1900. U.S. PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE NEW MARKETS Bayer obtained a U.S. patent for acetylsalicylic acid, aspirin, in 1900. WILLOW CONTINUED to be used until the Middle Ages in Europe, only to run into a major obstacle: the timber trade. the wicker industry needed willow for itself; in fact, the demand was so high that in some places the use of willow for medicinal reasons was completely prohibited. Even then, scientists were still making progress; in the mid-1700s, the Reverend Edward Stone wrote a note to the president of the Royal Society of London quantitatively describing the treatment of fever with willow bark powder. He was motivated in part by the Doctrine of Signatures, a philosophical principle that held that plants offered external clues about the types of diseases they could cure; willow is often found in damp soil, which was associated with fever. But it would take a war for aspirin to truly make a comeback. After colonizing the New World, Europe had begun treating pain and fever with quinine imported from South America. However, when Napoleon Bonaparte's rise to power plunged Europe into more than a decade of internecine strife, naval clashes between Britain and France cut off much of the continental continent from maritime trade. Napoleon and other leaders were forced to return to readily available sources of painkillers, such as willow. In the 1820s and 1830s, scientists succeeded in isolating the active ingredient, salicin, from willow bark. The bitter extract got its name from the Latin designation of the white willow, Salix alba; Because of its acidity in water, the compound became more commonly known as salicylic acid. The compound was eventually produced industrially from coal tar through a process discovered by Herman Kolbe, but its unpleasant side effects - an unpleasant taste and stomach irritation - led many consumers to comment that the cure was worse than the disease. The scientist of the German company Bayer, Felix Hoffman, created the modern form of aspirin by acetylating the hydroxyl group of salicylic acid, creating acetylsalicylic acid. Hoffman's father had complained about the side effects of the salicylic acid he was taking - says the official Bayer version - piquing Hoffman's interest. Hoffman also has another claim to fame: Doctors of the time were increasingly concerned about the addictiveness of morphine, and Hoffman synthesized the morphine derivative diacetylmorphine, named and sold by Bayer for a number of years as heroin "which is not addictive" for the "heroic heroes". " feeling it inspired in users. Recently, however, the exact nature of the discovery of acetylsalicylic acid has become a source of controversy. In 1949, Arthur Eichengrün, Hoffman's former boss at Bayer, claimed that it was his idea to acetylate l 'salicylic acid and that he was never given credit for this work. And it turns out that acetylsalicylic acid had already been invented decades earlier: the French chemist Charles Gerhardt ne,.