Thank you to Fish and Shui Ren for the reward, I bow in gratitude and will work hard.
Zhou Ziang nodded as a sign of his agreement.
Without resting his eyes on anyone around him, his hands moved swiftly across the lab bench, replaying in his mind the data from the "borrowed" paper he had read last night.
After about ten minutes, the solution of Yao Feng’s group remained transparent, far from the beautiful orange required by the experimental results.
The other group, with Helen, had their solution undergo several color changes, from red to light orange.
Just as the experiment time was about to end, Zhou Ziang suddenly asked, "May I borrow a measuring cup?"
All the steps were carried out in an orderly fashion until Zhou Ziang spoke up to borrow a wide-mouth bottle.
It was only then Yao Feng noticed that in the newly replaced vessels, the only one missing was the wide-mouth measuring cup, the very cup that had caused his finger to be eroded by nitric acid. How could Zhou be so careless?
Among the observers seated in the front row, someone frowned, discerning from the act of borrowing equipment that Zhou Ziang’s group was still not very experienced. It was generally frowned upon to interrupt others during an experimental process.
Perhaps to leave a better impression on the observers, Helen and her group did not voice any objections but instead pretended to lend the cup to Zhou Ziang with a pleasant demeanor.
Zhou soon returned the bottle, and after Helen checked it, she set it aside, waiting to use it for the final measurement.
The final step was the heating process; the alcohol lamps on both sides were already lit, and after several fusions of the chemical agents and purification, the solvent turned out to be a very beautiful orange-red, and Yao Feng finally sighed in relief.
Yao Feng used his left hand to bring over a pot of evergreen pine; the final product of today’s experiment was a modified leaf-falling agent.
Just a simple spray on the surface of a tree could cause the leaves to fall off. Such agents were widely used on large farms in the United States for selective weed control.
"This agent’s greatest advantage is that it has no odor, lasts for a short period, and after the leaves fall, it will automatically decompose harmful substances, causing no pollution to the topsoil," Yao Feng began to explain, his composure momentarily lost due to earlier events, but upon seeing the solvent on the alcohol lamp was exactly the same as the one he had prepared by hand,
Zhou Ziang used the experimental vessels and chemicals with just the right touch, and had Yao not known that he was just a freshman, he might have thought he was a senior researcher. With his heart at ease and the rekindled hope, Yao’s explanation returned to its usual standard.
"Pfft, what’s to brag about having no smell," scoffed Mitchell, her own tube of solvent also complete. All she needed to do was to pour it into the measuring cup.
Before Yao Feng could finish, Helen interjected, "Just an odorless common leaf-falling agent that any ordinary student of plant ecology could make. Our agent, however, has the scent of roses, and when used, one cannot even tell it’s a chemical solvent, plus it lasts a long time, guaranteeing that no new weeds will grow for three years."
Her pitch was more appealing than Yao Feng’s, and Mitchell had already poured all of the solvent into the wide-mouth bottle, gently shaking it. A pleasant scent of rose filled the laboratory, as dazzlingly brilliant as her smile, radiating infinitely.
Zhou Ziang watched from the side, the corners of his mouth lightly upturned, long-lasting effect, huh? Is a lifetime long enough?
Just as Mitchell was about to hand the measuring cup over to a Mengshan Company observer, the rose scent vanished, replaced by a foul smell akin to burning plastic.
"Shit, Agent Orange," the gentleman from Mengshan Company immediately stood up, his eyes filled with disgust, "What kind of joke is this, are you mocking us?" It was common knowledge that Mengshan Company had hired a renowned research institute under Cornell University to develop a new generation of leaf-falling agents, and regardless of the actual effect, the smell of Helen and Mitchell’s product had instantly driven the observers out of the lab.
Everyone knew the reason Mengshan Company had been condemned by both domestic and international public opinion for decades was that they supplied the government with "Agent Orange" as a biochemical weapon during the Vietnam War, causing immense damage to the forests and people of Vietnam.