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Green League

The Green League, (Vihreä liitto, Vihr; Gröna förbundet ; Ruoná lihttu; Ruánáá litto; Ruânn lett) shortened to the Greens, (Vihreät; de Gröna) is a green political party in Finland. Ideologically, the Green League is positioned on the centre-left of the political spectrum. It is a reformist party and it is supportive of feminism, animal rights and green liberal ideas.

Originally split on whether Finland should join the European Union, the Green League decided on being pro-European, it was also the first Finnish party in favor of the federalisation of the European Union. The Green League is among the midsized political parties in Finland. The Greens hold thirteen of the 200 seats in the Finnish Parliament and two of Finland's 15 European Parliament seats. The party is a member of the Global Greens and the European Green Party; its MEPs sit in the Greens–European Free Alliance group in the European Parliament.

Founded in 1987, the party absorbed a number of green organizations and their members, electing its first MPs in 1987. The party won ten seats in the 1991 election. Despite small losses in the 1995 election, Pekka Haavisto joined Paavo Lipponen's first cabinet, which was composed of a "rainbow" coalition. This made the Green League the first green party to form part of a national cabinet. The party remained in government until 2002 when it resigned in opposition to nuclear power. The party slowly rose in popularity between 1995 and 2007, when winning a total of 15 seats, and joined the center-right-led government. In the 2011 election, the party suffered significant losses, falling to ten seats, but remained in government. In 2015, the party recovered its losses from 2011, returning to 15 seats. In the 2019 election, the party achieved by far its best-ever result, winning 20 seats and 11.5% of the vote. They became the fifth-largest party and became the third-largest member of the Social Democratic-led government.

In the 2017 municipal elections, the Green League was the fourth biggest party with 534 seats. They gained 211 more seats from 2012 elections. Since June 2023, the party's leader and chairman has been Sofia Virta. From 2015 to 2019, the party was in opposition and provided harsh criticism regarding the actions of the conservative Sipilä Cabinet, such as financial support for economically well-off companies, Fortum's purchase of Uniper, and the expedited process of constitution-changing surveillance laws.

Founding
The Green League was founded on 28 February 1987 and was registered as a political party the next year. Political activity had begun already in the early 1980s, when environmental activists, feminists, disillusioned young politicians from the marginalized Liberal People's Party and other active groups began to campaign on green issues in Finland. In 1995, it was the first European green party to be part of a state-level cabinet.

The party was founded as a popular movement, which explains its name's descriptor liitto, "league". Initially, there was much resistance within the movement against the founding of a political party, motivated by Robert Michels' iron law of oligarchy, which claims that movements inevitably degenerate into oligarchies when they create a formal organization. The party still especially stresses openness and democratic decision-making. Even though liitto has been dropped from the party's website and advertisements, the word still remains in the official name.

Early activities (1983–1994)
The first two parliamentary representatives were elected even before the registration, in the 1983 parliamentary election. These were the first independent representatives in the Finnish Parliament. In 1987 the number of seats rose to four, and in 1991 to ten.

About half of the party's members were against Finland joining the European Union in 1994. Later, polls showed that most Greens were anti-Eurozone. The party heads declined to fight against euro adoption.

As part of the Lipponen Cabinets (1995–2003)
In the 1995 election, the Green League received a total of nine seats out of 200. The party joined the coalition cabinet led by the Social Democratic Party, and Pekka Haavisto became the Minister of the Environment, thus becoming the first green minister in Europe.

The Green League received 7.3% of the vote, and gained two additional seats in the 1999 election, raising the total to 11. The Greens continued in the next coalition cabinet, but resigned in protest on 26 May 2002, after the cabinet's decision to allow the construction of a new nuclear plant was accepted by Parliament.

Growth to mainstream appeal (2003–present)
In 2003, the Green League received 8.0% of the vote, receiving a total of 14 seats. They increased their seats to 15 in the 2007 election while receiving 8.5% of the vote. In the 2011 election, the party lost five seats.

In the 2009 European Parliament elections, the Greens gained two of the thirteen Finnish seats in the European Parliament, which were occupied by Satu Hassi and Heidi Hautala.

At the municipal level, the Greens are an important force in the politics of the main cities of Finland. In the municipal election of 2008 the Greens received 8.9% of the vote; the vote share was considerably higher in Helsinki, where the Greens became the second-largest party with 23.2% of the vote. In several other cities, the Greens achieved the position of the third-largest party. The Greens are weaker in rural area and especially in municipalities that experience high levels of outward migration.

By the 2017 Green League party congress, Niinistö had served three full two-year terms as the chairman and stepped down according to the rules of the party. In the following leadership election, there were six candidates running for party chairman, of whom MP Touko Aalto won the election.

Soon after Aalto's election, the popularity of the Green League surged in the polls and raised briefly as the second most popular party in the country. However, in September 2017 the poll numbers turned into a downward slope, which continued until autumn 2018. After taking a month of sick leave due to exhaustion in September 2018, Aalto soon announced that he was resigning from his post, citing depression and fatigue.

In November 2018, the Green League decided to choose a temporary chairman to lead the party into the 2019 parliamentary elections and until the next party convention. In the leadership election, former chairman Pekka Haavisto was once again elected as chairman.

In June 2019, Haavisto stepped down as the chairman of the party. Maria Ohisalo was the only candidate in the leadership election and was thus elected as chairman in the city of Pori.

In the 2023 parliamentary election, Ohisalo was re-elected with 6,937 votes. However, as the Greens suffered an election defeat, Ohisalo announced that she would not seek another term as chairman. In June 2023, she was replaced by Sofia Virta.

Ideology and policies
The Green League is no longer a protest party, nor an alternative movement. Some Green candidates reject classifying the party as either left-wing or right-wing. Economic opinions of the members range between left and right. However, members of the party on average place their party left of the Social Democratic Party and right of the Left Alliance.

The party is one of the strongest proponents for same-sex marriage. The party is also distinct in its opposition against universal male conscription and wants to opt for a gender-neutral, selective version. The eventual goal of the Greens is voluntary military service.

In 2015, the party included universal basic income (UBI) as a proposal in their platform. In February 2019, the party announced that it wanted to introduce a €300 universal basic income in the 2019 to 2023 parliamentary term, before transitioning to a €600 tax-free UBI during the following 2023 to 2027 parliamentary term.

In the spring of 2018, the party proposed lowering the voting age to 15.

The party stated in December 2018 that it supports investing €10 billion in Finland's railway infrastructure and improving rail connections in the country, including building high-speed rail connections.

In September 2021, the party voted to pass an internal motion supporting the legalisation and regulation of cannabis in Finland. It thus became the first party in Finland's Parliament to publicly state support for cannabis being legalised in the country.

Presidential elections
Parliamentarian and former MEP Heidi Hautala was a candidate in the presidential elections in 2000 and 2006, taking approximately a 3.5% share of votes in the first round in each. Pekka Haavisto was the first Green candidate in the 2012 election to enter the second round. Haavisto got an 18.8% share of votes in the first round, and lost to centre-right Sauli Niinistö in the second round held on 5 February.

Members of the Eduskunta from 2019–2023
The following 20 Greens politicians were elected to the Finnish Parliament in the 2019 parliamentary election. 16 out of 20 members are first-timers. 17 of the members are women.

Current members of the European Parliament
Since 2024, the Green League has been represented by two MEPs in the European Parliament.

title: Green League


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Edward W. Morley

Edward Williams Morley (January 29, 1838 – February 24, 1923) was an American scientist known for his precise and accurate measurement of the atomic weight of oxygen, and for the Michelson–Morley experiment.

Biography
Morley was born in Newark, New Jersey, to Anna Clarissa Treat and the Reverend Sardis Brewster Morley. Both parents were of early colonial ancestry and of purely British origin. He grew up in West Hartford, Connecticut. During his childhood, he suffered much from ill health and was therefore educated by his father at home until the age of nineteen.

In 1857 Morley entered Williams College at Williamstown, Massachusetts, his father's alma mater. He received his A.B. in 1860 and his master's degree in 1863. Around 1860 he gradually shifted his attention from chemistry, which fascinated him since he was child, to optics and astronomy. In 1860–61 he mounted a transit instrument, constructed a chronograph, and made the first accurate determination of the latitude of the college observatory. This determination was the subject of his first published paper, which was read before the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 1866.

Upon advice of his parents, Morley entered Andover Theological Seminary in 1861, finishing in 1864. It was here, probably, that he acquired a good working knowledge of Hebrew. From 1866 to 1868 he was a teacher in a private school and later, in 1868, he was called to preach in a small country parish in Ohio. At about the same time, he was appointed professor of chemistry in Western Reserve College (then situated at Hudson, Ohio and later moved to Cleveland and renamed Case Western Reserve University), where he remained until his retirement in 1906. This appointment was the turning point in his career. In 1873 he also became professor of chemistry in Cleveland Medical College, but resigned this chair in 1888 to have more time for research. Just before moving to Hudson he married Miss Imbella A. Birdsall.

During his residence in Cleveland, Morley assembled one of the best private collections of chemical periodicals in the United States. He even included Russian journals and learned enough of the Russian language to use them. After his retirement from teaching, the university purchased his library and relocated to the chemical laboratory named after him. In 1906, he moved to West Hartford, Connecticut, where he built a small house and a laboratory for his personal studies of rocks and minerals.

Morley was a prolific author; he published 55 articles. He outlived his wife by only a few months and, following a surgical operation, died in the Hartford Hospital in 1923.

Optics and astronomy
Morley's most-significant work came in the field of physics and optics. In this, he collaborated with and assisted the physicist Albert A. Michelson for several years around 1887. They set up, executed, and improved their techniques many times in what we call the Michelson–Morley experiment. This involved making more and more accurate measurements of the speed of light in various directions, and at different times of the year, as the Earth revolved in its orbit around the Sun. These careful measurements were created to measure the differences in the speed of light in different directions. Michelson and Morley always found that the speed of light did not vary at all depending on the direction of measurement, or the position of the Earth in its orbit, deducing what we call a "null result" for their speed-of-light experiments.

Neither he nor Michelson ever considered that these null results disproved the hypothesis of the existence of "luminiferous aether", in which electromagnetic waves were thought to be propagated. Their null results led the Irish physicist George Francis FitzGerald to postulate what we now call the FitzGerald–Lorentz contraction of physical objects in the direction of their movement in inertial frames of reference.

However, other scientists did come to the conclusion that the aether did not exist. The results of the Michelson–Morley experiments supported Albert Einstein's strong postulate in 1905 that the speed of light is a constant in all inertial frames of reference for his Special Theory of Relativity.

Morley also collaborated with Dayton Miller on positive aether experiments after his work with Michelson. Morley himself made measurements of the speed of light when it passes through a strong magnetic field. He also studied the thermal expansion of solid materials.

Chemistry
At Western Reserve College, Morley was required to teach, not only chemistry, but also geology and botany, leaving him little time for research. Nevertheless, he found time during the first ten years at Hudson to publish five articles, mostly on the accuracy of measurements.

In chemistry, his original field, Morley had worked on determining accurate values for the composition of the atmosphere and the weights of its gases. His work on the atomic weight of oxygen covered a period of eleven years. Much time was spent in the calibration of instruments and improving the measurement accuracy to the highest possible degree (ca. 1 part per 10,000). In 1895 he introduced a new value for the atomic weight ratio of oxygen to hydrogen, providing the most precise determination of the atomic weight of oxygen at the time. His research on the atomic weight of oxygen was recognized as a National Historic Chemical Landmark by the American Chemical Society in 1995.

Honors
Morley was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1892. He was the president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 1895 and he was the president of the American Chemical Society in 1899. In 1903, he was elected to the American Philosophical Society. He was awarded the Davy Medal, named for the great British chemist Sir Humphry Davy, by the Royal Society of London in 1907. He also won the Elliott Cresson Medal, awarded by the Franklin Institute of Pennsylvania, in 1912, for important contributions to the science of chemistry. He received the Willard Gibbs Award of the Chicago Section of the American Chemical Society in 1917.

The lunar crater Morley on the near side was named for him. The Morley Elementary School in West Hartford, Connecticut, was also named for him, as was the Morley Scientific Laboratory on the Williams College campus. His house in West Hartford was made a National Historic Landmark in 1975.

The Cleveland Section of the American Chemical Society (Cleveland-ACS) annually sponsors a regional award named in honor of Edward W. Morley, which consists of the Morley Medal in addition to a monetary honorarium. The purpose of this annual award by the Cleveland-ACS is to recognize contributions to chemistry through outstanding achievements in research, teaching, research administration, engineering, and public service. The contributions for which the award is given should have been made within about 250 miles of Cleveland, the research home of Edward W. Morley. Notable early awardees include Melvin S. Newman (1969) (known for Newman projections in organic chemistry), and Nobel Prize laureate George A. Olah in 1970. A list of all previous awardees to date is maintained by the ACS-Cleveland Section.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Edward W. Morley


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Strychnine

Strychnine (,, US chiefly )  is a highly toxic, colorless, bitter, crystalline alkaloid used as a pesticide, particularly for killing small vertebrates such as birds and rodents. Strychnine, when inhaled, swallowed, or absorbed through the eyes or mouth, causes poisoning which results in muscular convulsions and eventually death through asphyxia. While it is no longer used medicinally, it was used historically in small doses to strengthen muscle contractions, such as a heart and bowel stimulant and performance-enhancing drug. The most common source is from the seeds of the Strychnos nux-vomica tree.

Biosynthesis

Strychnine is a terpene indole alkaloid belonging to the Strychnos family of Corynanthe alkaloids, and it is derived from tryptamine and secologanin. The biosynthesis of strychnine was solved in 2022. The enzyme, strictosidine synthase, catalyzes the condensation of tryptamine and secologanin, followed by a Pictet-Spengler reaction to form strictosidine. Many steps have been inferred by isolation of intermediates from Strychnos nux-vomica. The next step is hydrolysis of the acetal, which opens the ring by elimination of glucose (O-Glu) and provides a reactive aldehyde. The nascent aldehyde is then attacked by a secondary amine to afford geissoschizine, a common intermediate of many related compounds in the Strychnos family.

A reverse Pictet-Spengler reaction cleaves the C2–C3 bond, while subsequently forming the C3–C7 bond via a 1,2-alkyl migration, an oxidation from a Cytochrome P450 enzyme to a spiro-oxindole, nucleophilic attack from the enol at C16, and elimination of oxygen forms the C2–C16 bond to provide dehydropreakuammicine. Hydrolysis of the methyl ester and decarboxylation leads to norfluorocurarine. Stereospecific reduction of the endocyclic double bond by NADPH and hydroxylation provides the Wieland-Gumlich aldehyde, which was first isolated by Heimberger and Scott in 1973, although previously synthesized by Wieland and Gumlich in 1932. To elongate the appendage by two carbons, acetyl-CoA is added to the aldehyde in an aldol reaction to afford prestrychnine. Strychnine is then formed by a facile addition of the amine with the carboxylic acid or its activated CoA thioester, followed by ring-closure via displacement of an activated alcohol.

Chemical synthesis
As early researchers noted, the strychnine molecular structure, with its specific array of rings, stereocenters, and nitrogen functional groups, is a complex synthetic target, and has stimulated interest for that reason and for interest in the structure–activity relationships underlying its pharmacologic activities. An early synthetic chemist targeting strychnine, Robert Burns Woodward, quoted the chemist who determined its structure through chemical decomposition and related physical studies as saying that "for its molecular size it is the most complex organic substance known" (attributed to Sir Robert Robinson).

The first total synthesis of strychnine was reported by the research group of R. B. Woodward in 1954, and is considered a classic in this field. The Woodward account published in 1954 was very brief (3 pages), but was followed by a 42-page report in 1963. The molecule has since received continuing wide attention in the years since for the challenges to synthetic organic strategy and tactics presented by its complexity; its synthesis has been targeted and its stereocontrolled preparation independently achieved by more than a dozen research groups since the first success.

Mechanism of action
Strychnine is a neurotoxin which acts as an antagonist of glycine and acetylcholine receptors. It primarily affects the motor nerve fibers in the spinal cord which control muscle contraction. An impulse is triggered at one end of a nerve cell by the binding of neurotransmitters to the receptors. In the presence of an inhibitory neurotransmitter, such as glycine, a greater quantity of excitatory neurotransmitters must bind to receptors before an action potential is generated. Glycine acts primarily as an agonist of the glycine receptor, which is a ligand-gated chloride channel in neurons located in the spinal cord and in the brain. This chloride channel allows the negatively charged chloride ions into the neuron, causing a hyperpolarization which pushes the membrane potential further from threshold. Strychnine is an antagonist of glycine; it binds noncovalently to the same receptor, preventing the inhibitory effects of glycine on the postsynaptic neuron. Therefore, action potentials are triggered with lower levels of excitatory neurotransmitters. When the inhibitory signals are prevented, the motor neurons are more easily activated and the victim has spastic muscle contractions, resulting in death by asphyxiation. Strychnine binds the Aplysia californica acetylcholine binding protein (a homolog of nicotinic receptors) with high affinity but low specificity, and does so in multiple conformations.

Toxicity
In high doses, strychnine is very toxic to humans (minimum lethal oral dose in adults is 30–120 mg) and many other animals (oral = 16 mg/kg in rats, 2 mg/kg in mice), and poisoning by inhalation, swallowing, or absorption through eyes or mouth can be fatal. S. nux-vomica seeds are generally effective as a poison only when they are crushed or chewed before swallowing because the pericarp is quite hard and indigestible; poisoning symptoms may therefore not appear if the seeds are ingested whole.

Animal toxicity
Strychnine poisoning in animals usually occurs from ingestion of baits designed for use against gophers, rats, squirrels, moles, chipmunks and coyotes. Strychnine is also used as a rodenticide, but is not specific to such unwanted pests and may kill other small animals. In the United States, most baits containing strychnine have been replaced with zinc phosphide baits since 1990. In the European Union, rodenticides with strychnine have been forbidden since 2006. Some animals are immune to strychnine; usually these have evolved resistance to poisonous strychnos alkaloids in the fruit they eat, such as fruit bats. The drugstore beetle has a symbiotic gut yeast that allows it to digest pure strychnine.

Strychnine toxicity in rats is dependent on sex. It is more toxic to females than to males when administered via subcutaneous injection or intraperitoneal injection. Differences are due to higher rates of metabolism by male rat liver microsomes. Dogs and cats are more susceptible among domestic animals, pigs are believed to be as susceptible as dogs, and horses are able to tolerate relatively large amounts of strychnine. Birds affected by strychnine poisoning exhibit wing droop, salivation, tremors, muscle tenseness, and convulsions. Death occurs as a result of respiratory arrest. The clinical signs of strychnine poisoning relate to its effects on the central nervous system. The first clinical signs of poisoning include nervousness, restlessness, twitching of the muscles, and stiffness of the neck. As the poisoning progresses, the muscular twitching becomes more pronounced and convulsions suddenly appear in all the skeletal muscles. The limbs are extended and the neck is curved to opisthotonus. The pupils are widely dilated. As death approaches, the convulsions follow one another with increased rapidity, severity, and duration. Death results from asphyxia due to prolonged paralysis of the respiratory muscles. Following the ingestion of strychnine, symptoms of poisoning usually appear within 15 to 60 minutes.

Human toxicity

After injection, inhalation, or ingestion, the first symptoms to appear are generalized muscle spasms. They appear very quickly after inhalation or injection – within as few as five minutes – and take somewhat longer to manifest after ingestion, typically approximately 15 minutes. With a very high dose, the onset of respiratory failure and brain death can occur in 15 to 30 minutes. If a lower dose is ingested, other symptoms begin to develop, including seizures, cramping, stiffness, hypervigilance, and agitation. Seizures caused by strychnine poisoning can start as early as 15 minutes after exposure and last 12–24 hours. They are often triggered by sights, sounds, or touch and can cause other adverse symptoms, including hyperthermia, rhabdomyolysis, myoglobinuric kidney failure, metabolic acidosis, and respiratory acidosis. During seizures, mydriasis (abnormal dilation), exophthalmos (protrusion of the eyes), and nystagmus (involuntary eye movements) may occur.

As strychnine poisoning progresses, tachycardia (rapid heart beat), hypertension (high blood pressure), tachypnea (rapid breathing), cyanosis (blue discoloration), diaphoresis (sweating), water-electrolyte imbalance, leukocytosis (high number of white blood cells), trismus (lockjaw), risus sardonicus (spasm of the facial muscles), and opisthotonus (dramatic spasm of the back muscles, causing arching of the back and neck) can occur. In rare cases, the affected person may experience nausea or vomiting.

The proximate cause of death in strychnine poisoning can be cardiac arrest, respiratory failure, multiple organ failure, or brain damage.

For occupational exposures to strychnine, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration and the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health have set exposure limits at 0.15 mg/m3 over an 8-hour work day.

Because strychnine produces some of the most dramatic and painful symptoms of any known toxic reaction, strychnine poisoning is often portrayed in literature and film including authors Agatha Christie and Arthur Conan Doyle.

Absorption
Strychnine may be introduced into the body orally, by inhalation, or by injection. It is a potently bitter substance, and in humans has been shown to activate bitter taste receptors TAS2R10 and TAS2R46. Strychnine is rapidly absorbed from the gastrointestinal tract.

Distribution
Strychnine is transported by plasma and red blood cells. Due to slight protein binding, strychnine leaves the bloodstream quickly and distributes to bodily tissues. Approximately 50% of the ingested dose can enter the tissues in 5 minutes. Also within a few minutes of ingestion, strychnine can be detected in the urine. Little difference was noted between oral and intramuscular administration of strychnine in a 4 mg dose. In persons killed by strychnine, the highest concentrations are found in the blood, liver, kidney and stomach wall. The usual fatal dose is 60–100 mg strychnine and is fatal after a period of 1–2 hours, though lethal doses vary depending on the individual.

Metabolism
Strychnine is rapidly metabolized by the liver microsomal enzyme system requiring NADPH and O2. Strychnine competes with the inhibitory neurotransmitter glycine resulting in an excitatory state. However, the toxicokinetics after overdose have not been well described. In most severe cases of strychnine poisoning, the patient dies before reaching the hospital. The biological half-life of strychnine is about 10 hours.

Excretion
A few minutes after ingestion, strychnine is excreted unchanged in the urine, and accounts for about 5 to 15% of a sublethal dose given over 6 hours. Approximately 10 to 20% of the dose will be excreted unchanged in the urine in the first 24 hours. The percentage excreted decreases with the increasing dose. Of the amount excreted by the kidneys, about 70% is excreted in the first 6 hours, and almost 90% in the first 24 hours. Excretion is virtually complete in 48 to 72 hours.

Treatment
There is no specific antidote for strychnine but recovery from exposure is possible with early supportive medical treatment. Strychnine poisoning demands aggressive management with early control of muscle spasms, intubation for loss of airway control, toxin removal (decontamination), intravenous hydration and potentially active cooling efforts in the context of hyperthermia as well as hemodialysis in kidney failure (strychnine has not been shown to be removed by hemodialysis). Strychnine poisoning in today's age generally results from herbal remedies and strychnine-containing rodenticides. Moreover, management should be tailored to the patient's history of chief complaint and workup to rule out other causes. If a poisoned person is able to survive for 6 to 12 hours subsequent to initial dose, they have a good prognosis. The patient should be kept in a quiet and darkened room, because excessive manipulation and loud noises may cause convulsions. Because these convulsions are extremely painful, appropriate analgesics should be administered. Treatment of strychnine poisoning involves oral administration of activated charcoal which adsorbs strychnine within the digestive tract; unabsorbed strychnine is removed from the stomach by gastric lavage, along with tannic acid or potassium permanganate solutions to oxidize strychnine. Activated charcoal may be beneficial, but its benefit remains unproven, and its use should be avoided in any patient with a tenuous airway or altered mental status. Activated charcoal is a substance that can bind to certain toxins in the digestive tract and prevent their absorption into the bloodstream. It may be helpful in cases of strychnine poisoning if administered soon after ingestion, but its effectiveness is not guaranteed. According to one source, activated charcoal should be given within one hour of ingestion to have a significant effect, still, this source gives general advice on the use of charcoal, this advice is not specific to strychnine poisoning. Therefore, other sources, that consider specifically strychnine poisoning, state that activated charcoal may be considered even after one hour of ingestion, depending on the dose and type of strychnine-containing product. The properties of charcoal in strychnine are a subject of research. Anyway, charcoal is a recommended remedy in strychnine poisoning, given that there is no specific antidote. Therefore, the decision to use activated charcoal should be based on the individual circumstances of each case and the availability of other treatment options. Still, the use of charcoal should not substitute supportive care that includes intravenous fluids and medications for convulsions and spasms, if necessary. Seizures are controlled by anticonvulsants such as phenobarbital or diazepam, along with muscle relaxants such as dantrolene to combat muscle rigidity. Historically chloroform or heavy doses of chloral, bromide, urethane or amyl nitrite were used to restrain the convulsions. Because medications such as diazepam are not effective to relieve convulsions in all cases, concurrent use of barbiturates and/or propofol can be utilized.

The sine qua non of strychnine toxicity is the "awake" seizure, in which tonic-clonic activity occurs but the patient is alert and oriented throughout and afterwards. Accordingly, George Harley (1829–1896) showed in 1850 that curare (wourali) was effective for the treatment of tetanus and strychnine poisoning.

History
Strychnine was the first alkaloid to be identified in plants of the genus Strychnos, family Loganiaceae. Strychnos, named by Carl Linnaeus in 1753, is a genus of trees and climbing shrubs of the Gentianales order. The genus contains 196 various species and is distributed throughout the warm regions of Asia (58 species), America (64 species), and Africa (75 species). The seeds and bark of many plants in this genus contain strychnine.

The toxic and medicinal effects of Strychnos nux-vomica have been well known from the times of ancient India, although the chemical compound itself was not identified and characterized until the 19th century. The inhabitants of these countries had historical knowledge of the species Strychnos nux-vomica and Saint-Ignatius' bean (Strychnos ignatii). Strychnos nux-vomica is a tree native to the tropical forests on the Malabar Coast in Southern India, Sri Lanka and Indonesia, which attains a height of about 12 m. The tree has a crooked, short, thick trunk and the wood is close grained and very durable. The fruit has an orange color and is about the size of a large apple with a hard rind and contains five seeds, which are covered with a soft wool-like substance. The ripe seeds look like flattened disks, which are very hard. These seeds are the chief commercial source of strychnine and were first imported to and marketed in Europe as a poison to kill rodents and small predators. Strychnos ignatii is a woody climbing shrub of the Philippines. The fruit of the plant, known as Saint Ignatius' bean, contains as many as 25 seeds embedded in the pulp. The seeds contain more strychnine than other commercial alkaloids. The properties of S. nux-vomica and S. ignatii are substantially those of the alkaloid strychnine.

Strychnine was first discovered by French chemists Joseph Bienaimé Caventou and Pierre-Joseph Pelletier in 1818 in the Saint-Ignatius' bean. In some Strychnos plants a 9,10-dimethoxy derivative of strychnine, the alkaloid brucine, is also present. Brucine is not as poisonous as strychnine. Historic records indicate that preparations containing strychnine (presumably) had been used to kill dogs, cats, and birds in Europe as far back as 1640. It was allegedly used by convicted murderer William Palmer to kill his final victim, John Cook. It was also used during World War II by the Dirlewanger Brigade against civilian population.

The structure of strychnine was first determined in 1946 by Sir Robert Robinson and in 1954 this alkaloid was synthesized in a laboratory by Robert B. Woodward. This is one of the most famous syntheses in the history of organic chemistry. Both chemists won the Nobel prize (Robinson in 1947 and Woodward in 1965).

Strychnine has been used as a plot device in the author Agatha Christie's murder mysteries.

Other Uses
Strychnine was popularly used as an athletic performance enhancer and recreational stimulant in the late 19th century and early 20th century, due to its convulsant effects. One notorious instance of its use was during the 1904 Olympics marathon, when track-and-field athlete Thomas Hicks was unwittingly administered a concoction of egg whites and brandy laced with a small amount of strychnine by his assistants in a vain attempt to boost his stamina. Hicks won the race, but was hallucinating by the time he reached the finish line, and soon after collapsed.

Maximilian Theodor Buch proposed it as a cure for alcoholism around the same time. It was thought to be similar to coffee, and also has been used and abused recreationally.

Its effects are well-described in H. G. Wells's novella The Invisible Man: the title character states "Strychnine is a grand tonic ... to take the flabbiness out of a man." Dr Kemp, an acquaintance, replies: "It's the devil. It's the palaeolithic in a bottle."

title: Strychnine