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Suppose you were trying to invent a bright orange powder that could easily dye clothes and be hard to wash off. Using your knowledge of quantum mechanics you'd design this symmetrical molecule where an electron's wavefunction can vibrate back and forth along a chain of carbons at the frequency of green light. Absorbing green light makes it look orange! And this molecule doesn't dissolve in water.
Yes: you'd invent turmeric!
Or more precisely 'curcurmin', the molecule that gives turmeric its special properties.
The black atoms are carbons, the white are hydrogens and the red are oxygens.
Read on and check out what pure curcurmin looks like.
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@johncarlosbaez lol does this work with any color you want? just stick enough Cs between the aromatic groups?
@mc - basically yes! But the aromatic groups appear to be optional. The reason tomatoes are red is 'lycopene':
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@mc - and the reason carrots are orange is beta-carotene.
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@mc - I got into this when I saw a bunch of autumn leaves again in Washington DC, and realized it's all due to quantum delocalization of electrons! I wrote about it here:
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https://johncarlosbaez.wordpress.com/2021/11/28/anthocyanins/
@johncarlosbaez @mc anthocyanin. How is it that I had never heard this word before last week and now it’s everywhere?
