With the support of his assistant Sahachiro Hata Ehrlich discovered in 1909 that Compound 606, Arsphenamine effectively combatted " spirillum " spirochaetes bacteria, one of whose subspecies causes syphilis.
12.
Arsphenamine proved to be the first effective treatment for syphilis, a disease which prior to that time was incurable and led inexorably to severe skin ulceration, neurological damage, and death.
13.
During the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries, a number of arsenic compounds were used as medicines, including arsphenamine ( by Paul Ehrlich ) and arsenic trioxide ( by Thomas Fowler ).
14.
By 1910 Paul Ehrlich and his laboratory group began developing arsenic-based arsphenamine, ( Salvarsan ), as the first effective medicinal treatment of syphilis, and thereby initiated the medical practice of chemotherapy.
15.
The first synthetic antimicrobial drug, arsphenamine, discovered in 1909 by Sahachiro Hata in the laboratory of Paul Ehrlich, is not toxic to bacteria until it has been converted to an active form by the body.
16.
Toxic metal compounds were used a lot, arsenic in the form of Fowler's solution, arsphenamine, or arsenic trioxide; thallium salts, various forms of mercury, like mercury ( II ) chloride.
17.
While in Germany, he took the opportunity to learn about chemotherapy at the German National Institute for Experimental Therapeutics in Frankfurt, where he assisted Paul Ehrlich in the discovery of arsphenamine, which proved effective in curing syphilis.
18.
Arsphenamine was originally called " 606 " because it was the sixth in the sixth group of compounds synthesized for testing; it was marketed by Hoechst AG under the trade name "'Salvarsan "'in 1910.
19.
Ehrlich and Bertheim's 606th arsenobenzene, synthesized in 1907, was arsphenamine, found ineffective against microorganism involved in syphilis, a disease roughly equivalent then to today's AIDS . In the late 1940s, Salvarsan was replaced in most regions by penicillin, yet organic arsenicals remained in use for trypanosomiasis.
