Talk:Capsaicin

Surely it should be chilli peppers throughtout this article? Not Chile!

Yeah, that's correct, Chile is the country. I have a question as well - can eating chillies cause intestinal pain, or was that just me suffering food poisoning? 80.43.29.109 17:29, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

No, the term chilli denotes Chilli con Carne (Chile with Meat) or the mystery spice mixture used therein. Although Chile is a country, chile (e with accent grav) denotes the berries of any plant in the genus Capsicum.Sean 21:25, 16 October 2006 (PST) and 20:43, 17 October 2006 (PST)

There are any number of reasons you could have gotten intestinal pain. For medical advice, please refer to your general practitioner. Shinobu (talk) 07:25, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Chile, the word in Spanish for chili peppers, derives from the nahuatl sili. It is unclear why the exact same word was used to name the south american country. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.69.125.151 (talk) 20:24, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

Who was "Thresh" ? Who re-discovered capsaicin and when ?

Many reputable sources claim that "L. T. Thresh" discovered capsaicin in 1846 after C. F. Bucholz discovered it in 1816. The citation is:

L. T. Thresh (1846) "Isolation of capsaicin," Pharmacy Journal, vol. 6, pages 941-942.

However, after further research to determine who "L. T. Thresh" was -- "Thresh" is also listed in some sources as "Thomas Thresh" or "C. F. Thresh" and even as a doctor in India -- I have found evidence that capsaicin was actually re-discovered by John Clough Thresh (1850-1932, an English chemist, pharmacist, geologist, physician, and public health offical) in 1876 -- NOT 1846. The most frequent citation for J. C. Thresh is:

"Capsaicin, the active principle in Capsicum fruits" The Pharmaceutical Journal and Transactions, 3rd series, vol. 7, no. 315, page 21 (8 July 1876).

Some sources cite an earlier article by J. C. Thresh:

"Isolation of capsaicin" The Pharmaceutical Journal and Transactions, 3rd series, vol. 6, pages 941-947 (1876).

So the "Pharmacy Journal" of the L. T. Thresh citation is probably "The Pharmaceutical Journal and Transactions".

I suspect that the many citations which state that "L. T. Thresh" re-discovered capsaicin in 1846 were based on one erroneous original citation, which has been copied again and again throughout the literature. Apparently few people ever bothered to try to find the original article. Cwkmail (talk) 08:01, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

---

Sorry about the latest flurry of revisions to the "History" section of this article; however, I've done additional research on the subject, and (as usual) I've found that the information in many references is incorrect. British chemist/physician John C. Thresh did try to isolate capsaicin; however, the melting point that he observed for capsaicin was below the currently accepted melting point, so his sample was impure. Furthermore, his empirical formula for capsaicin was wrong: he failed to detect the presence of nitrogen in capsaicin. Austrian Karl Micko recorded a melting point for capsaicin that was consistent with the accepted value, so his sample was almost certainly chemically pure; however, his empirical formula for capsaicin was also (slightly) wrong (one extra hydrogen atom). Nelson determined the correct empirical formula for capsaicin, but couldn't completely determine its structure. It wasn't until 1930 that Spath and Darling finally determined capsaicin's structure. So progress in understanding capsaicin has been gradual -- limited by the chemical techniques and technology that was available.--Cwkmail (talk) 18:34, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

Sensitivity

Is there a reason that one's mouth, skin, eyes, etc, will burn.. and later on, one's anus.. but nowhere in between in the GI tract? Does it require air to activate? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.73.70.113 (talk) 00:27, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

It's likely related to the lack of the specific neuron activated by the chemical. We don't have a need for, and also do not have heat sensors in most of our GI tract. --Puellanivis (talk) 06:12, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

tumorigenic vs. Carcinigenic

The article claims

Carcinogenic, co-carcinogenic, anticarcinogenic, antitumorigenic, tumor promotion, and anti-tumor promotion effects of capsaicin have been reported in animal studies

can someone explain the difference between anticarcinogenic and antitumorigenic or tumor promotion and Carcinogenic. It seems like a lot of these words are saying the same thing, for example tumorigenic links to the same place as Carcinogenic with no explanation of the difference on the page. Wouldn't the following sentence be less redundant

"Carcinogenic, co-carcinogenic, anticarcinogenic effects of capsaicin have been reported in animal studies." --MATThematical (talk) 19:36, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

Sinus Buster Merge Proposal

I'm proposing that Sinus Buster be re-directed to capsaicin nasal spray which should be re-directed here. I was going to improve the article, but there are no secondary sources in pubmed. I plan on writing a little blurb with citations to some of the primary sources, calling it an experimental treatment that's available OTC. Comments? Rknight (talk) 07:30, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

Can you explain why this idea is anything other than spam posing as nonsense? Firefight (talk) 17:08, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

Sinus Buster seems to be a separate product made from capsaicin and has no immediate relation to capsaicin itself(even though I have never seen it before). Hence it should not be merged with the article capsaicin.inyrface (talk) 15:35, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

There are news sources: [1] -- filter out the press releases, but you'll find a few, like this one: [2]. This may be at the margin of notability, but I wouldn't jump the gun and merge into that product. I think it would be more relevant on a page on nasal sprays for sinus problems, than on the page for capsaicin. Perhaps it deserves a brief mention both places though, if we decide it's not notable enough for its own page. But I'm seeing enough sources that I'm open to the possibility that it actually is notable. Cazort (talk) 00:14, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

Given that this is one of a number of similar products, and (?) only available in the US (this is an international site, after all), it would be worth a one-link mention in the "medical" section at the most. This appears at first glance to be a case of someone using the merge function to create an advert. Huseyx2 (talk) 11:40, 17 October 2011 (UTC)