Chemistry

2. A Day in the Life of a Chemical Company Intern(2)

‘Huh?’

The strange flow of dust particles had accumulated on her coat.

Due to the phenomenon of the free electrons sticking to her clothes in all directions were pouring in, the dust particles she had brought along were swept away with them.

‘Wow, too much has accumulated.’

Whether she knew that she was in a state of electrostatic saturation or not, she seemed to have no intention of escaping from her reading session.

Judging by her appearance, if she touched metal, she would experience an electrostatic shock about three times more painful than what he had felt earlier.

Although it couldn’t be attributed solely to the dust particles that he had blown away, Jeong-woo felt a moral responsibility. It was definitely not because she was overly beautiful for a woman he had accidentally met.

‘Um. That’s a Defcon 1 situation in the electrostatic world. It’s very dangerous.’

Jeong-woo briefly coughed with a sense of crisis as he looked around.

Thud. Thud.

The subway was running calmly and familiarly on the track, making a soothing sound.

“…….”

Jeong-woo focused on finding a solution.

The unique insight of a molecular biologist, which combines chemical information imprinted in brain cells and the visual neurons, began to enlarge the molecular structure of the “electrostatic bomb coat.”

Constellations of elements entwined like chains over the fibers appeared in Jeong-woo’s field of vision.

‘If the amide bond is this dense, such as CO… NH… CH…, the probability of charge coalescence due to friction is high.’

The material was from the nylon family, which was similar to the phenomenon in which skirts stick to stockings due to electrostatics when women wear stockings.

‘Still, there’s no reason for it to become an electrostatic bomb. Wait. Na… O… Si?’

Jeong-woo’s eyes lit up as he discovered a transparent compound that was stuck in the molecular structure of the fiber. A dust particle passing by trembled as if it could explode at any moment when it stuck to this compound.

‘Was it you?’

The name of the compound that easily captured free electrons was sodium silicate. If it could be made to undergo an ion reaction to the alkaline side by sticking to clothing with an abundance of this compound, it would become an excellent catalyst to lure free electrons. And since it was involved in the fiber molecular structure, it would naturally make the clothes stiffer, so it could only become an “electrostatic bomb coat.”

‘Ion neutralization comes first. If it’s sodium silicate, you can see some effect just by spraying water right away…’

While thinking about how to present the solution to someone who is seeing this for the first time and needs to reduce the electrostatic discharge level from level 1 to level 5, she lifted her head briefly from the document she had been focusing on.

‘Hmm.’

Her clear, eyelidless eyes were fixed on him as if to say, “Why are you staring at me like that?”

‘Well… even though I was lost in thought about the chemical world, it’s true that I was staring so intently that it could be considered rude.’ Jeong-woo stammered, pointing to the woman’s hand.

“Be careful of static electricity.”

“What?”

“When you get off the subway, sprinkle a little water on your coat and shake it out. Ah, your clothes are too stiff…”

The frantic movement of people began as the train pulled into the station. Jeong-woo was also caught up in it and pushed through the crowd.

‘What did he say?’

Song Boyeong felt bewildered by the stranger’s words. She looked around, trying to find him, but it wasn’t easy to spot someone she had just met in a crowded train.

Bzzz-

Trying to turn off her thoughts and read the document again, her phone rang from inside her bag. It was her senior colleague at work, Lee Dong-gil.

• Song!

“Hello, senior.”

• Where are you? Are you on your way to work?

“I’m on the subway.”

• Are you Boyeong?

“I used to take the subway every day in Munich.”

• Now that you’ve started dressing up like a commoner, my grandfather is probably telling you to start taking management seriously…

“Senior”

Song Boyeong’s eyebrows shot up in frustation.

“If you’re just going to make small talk, please stop. I’m busy.”

• Oh! Wait, there’s a huge news.

Song Boyeong responded with a look of disinterest.

“What is it?”

• I just met the head of the greeting department and heard shocking news. They recruited a high-level researcher in the lab as a parachute hire.

“Isn’t recruiting researchers something that happens from time to time?”

• Don’t be surprised. It was scouted by none other than Dr. Cheon Seung-guk himself.

Despite the warning not to be surprised over the phone, Song Boyeong’s eyes widened.

“Dr. Cheon? He’s been on sabbatical and out of touch for six months. When did he come back?”

• Oh, shoot. I didn’t ask about that. Should I go to the personnel department and try to find out more? Then let’s go for brunch at the cafe down the street and talk…

“It’s okay. I can ask him myself.”

• Wait a minute! Song…

Click.

Putting her phone back in her bag, Song Boyeong looked down at the A4 document she had been reading.

[Next-generation Bio-code]

The paper written by Cheon Seung-guk during his tenure at the Heidelberg Center for Biochemistry in Germany was still a groundbreaking theory even after a decade.

“The person Dr. Cheon scouted himself? I have to meet him.”

Song Boyeong felt even more motivated to study, with the anticipation that Cheon Seung-guk might return someday.

She focused on reading the next paragraph of the paper.

Then, as the subway shook, she reflexively touched the wall and was startled by a crackling static electricity spark.

“Ouch….”

Pain shot through her elbow.

The sound was loud enough to startle the elderly woman sitting in the priority seat.

“Are you okay, student?”

“I’m okay, grandma.”

Song Boyeong couldn’t help but smile at being referred to as a student, although technically she still was one.

At 26, she could still be considered a graduate student. However, it had already been a year since she became a respectable researcher.

She bowed her head to the concerned grandmother and put her finger, which had received a sharp shock, in her mouth.

‘That’s why I hate winter.’

She unconsciously looked at her hand and had to shake her head at the thought that the man predicted this and warned her.

“It can’t be true.”

Song Boyeong shook her head.

And she quietly began reading the paper again. However, not long after, she was disturbed by a loud voice coming from beyond the crowd.

“Ah! I don’t want to! Let’s go home, Mom!”

“Oh, come on! Let’s be quiet.”

A crying child. Other passengers were agitated because of it. The noisy voice that broke through the gap of concentration continued throughout the next station.

Song Boyeong decided that she couldn’t read anymore and just took a screenshot of the paper. Trying to force herself to read something so difficult only gave her a headache.

She briefly lowered her head to organize her bag and saw a text message on her phone.

[Ask me instead of the HR manager. Let’s have a cup of tea. How about the break room at 10 o’clock? Oh, and this is a parachute badge.]

A picture that looked like it was taken from the personnel record book was attached.

‘Hmm? This face…?’

Jeong-woo was looking at the little child who was crying sadly. Was he around five years old?

“I’m sorry. My child has atopic dermatitis.”

The little child’s mother kept apologizing and scolded the child not to scratch his arms because it was itchy and he kept scratching.

The child cried and scratched, while the mother tried to stop him from getting scars. The child kicked and screamed, while the mother scolded him.

‘Is that what a troublemaker looks like?’

Jeong-woo couldn’t say anything about the child who couldn’t adapt to the atmosphere in the subway. Anyway, the cause of the noise was that child.

“Ahem!”

An old man who was sitting next to them and reading the newspaper sent an obvious look of displeasure.

“What’s so great about atopic dermatitis? You should know public ethics as an adult. Damn government officials, why did they get rid of the moral education textbooks? Ugh, tsk tsk.”

He then spread the newspaper as much as possible, as if to show the passengers on both sides, pushing them away. This behavior didn’t look good either.

The crying child fortunately stopped crying, but his face froze slightly at the old man’s voice.

Jeong-woo absentmindedly looked at the child and saw the dust particles gathering above his head. The cause was the furry hat made of fur.

As he was already suffering from atopic dermatitis, he thought he should prevent static electricity, and reached out to shake his hand above the child’s head.

‘Oh. If you want to go, go bother that grumpy old man next to you!’

He didn’t consciously think about his actions.

However, the dust particle actually wrapped around his palm and flew away into the distance. The problem was that the old man’s few strands of hair reacted to the dust particle and stood up.

‘That’s strange. How did it affect him?’

Wondering about the principle, his hand fluttered and stayed in the air above the old man’s head. The old man’s hair stood up like it was hit by lightning as it moved along with his hand.

“Wow.”

Jeong-woo moved his hand to the side, thinking he might have seen it wrong. The old man’s hair moved along with it.

As the old man reading the newspaper noticed something strange and looked up, Jeong-woo quickly put away his hand. The old man, who had been making uncomfortable to the crowd, soon lowered his head.

‘Ah, my heart is racing.’

The little boy sitting next to him watched the whole scene with frozen expression, so Jeong-woo put a finger to his lips and whispered “shh.”

The little boy nodded his head vigorously, as if this was some kind of secret.

Jeong-woo turned his gaze with his hand.

‘What’s going on? Why are free electronic souls listening to me? My hands are not covered in sodium bicarbonate.’

He tried to find the answer from his emerging knowledge of chemistry.

It could be said that just now, the palm of his hand was momentarily replaced by a [+] pole and then changed to a [-] pole.

In theory, it was possible.

Watching a horror movie and getting a goosebump was also a kind of biological electrical reaction transmitted to sensory organs.

If it were possible to control this electrical signal even slightly, could it be possible to induce ion concentration in the palm of the hand?

‘Let’s try it.’

As he stretched out his palm, the dust particles gathered like a whirlwind. No one could see it, but it was a sight that Jeong-woo could not help but admire.

‘Should I call this chemical sense control?’

The experience of peeking into the molecular world was too shocking, and the possibility of being an electrostatic master was just as mysterious.

After roughly understanding it, Jeong-woo turned his eyes to the little boy. His eyes were full of anticipation, and he kept glancing at him as if his atopic itch had subsided.

‘Shall we try it again as an experiment?’

Jeong-woo reached out his hand over the old man’s head. Soon, he felt as if the nerves in his palm were gathering [+] ions.

As the [-] charged dust particles from all sides rushed in and stirred up a storm in the nano world, the old man’s hair reacted as well. Just then, a commercial song played on the subway broadcast.

• Nana~ What to do~ Seoul City Hall, Good Neighbor Dental Clinic….

‘Shall we dance with DOC?’

It was not intentional, but the music was so lively that Jeong-woo’s shoulders slightly shook, and as a result, a huge storm hit the world of dust particles.

The old man’s hair started to wiggle and dance along to the music.