Gutta-percha

Palaquium gutta, source of gutta-percha latex
(from Köhler's Medizinal-Pflanzen)

"I want to say one word to you. Just one word. Plastics." But long before Mr. McGuire uttered these immortal lines from the 1967 film 'The Graduate,' and long before the advent of plastics, there was gutta-percha.  Isn't that a great word? I just learned it from a great book I am reading, "Science: A Four Thousand Year History," by Patricia Fara. Perhaps you already know that gutta-percha is a natural latex made from the sap of the tropical tree Palaquium gutta, and that its name comes from the Malay 'getah perca,' which means 'percha sap'. Gutta-percha was hugely important in its time, as it was used to insulate undersea telegraph cables, including the first trans-Atlantic telegraph cable. Nowadays, polyethylene plastic insulates these cables, and gutta-percha has been relegated to other uses, such as for root canals. Ouch.