Ammonium bituminosulfonate

Ammonium bituminosulphonate, also marketed under the trademark Ichthammol and Ichthyology, is a product based on natural raw materials. It is produced in the first step by dry distillation of kerogenreichem oil shale, a petroleum source rock in which anoxic conditions by an accumulation of organic material - primarily plankton - took place. By sulfonation and subsequent neutralization of certain fractions of the crude shale oil ammonium bituminosulphonate results as sulfonate salt in aqueous solution.

Ammonium bituminosulphonate is a multi- component mixture, mainly of sulfonated thiophene derivatives. Unlike tar ( coal tar ), polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons ( PAHs) are present only in trace amounts. From elemental analysis calculated Eugen Baumann and Carl Schotten 1883 a chemical formula for the active ingredient neutralized with sodium hydroxide solution. However, Paul Gerson Unna pointed out in 1897 that, despite the agreement of the elemental analysis of the formula, the ammonium bituminosulphonate " is complicated composite body " field. The content of organically bound sulfur (relative to the dried substance) is, according to Pharmacopoeia requirements (Ph. Eur ) above 10.5%.

The substance is used in medicine as a tool for the treatment of some forms of skin diseases such as acne, eczema, boils, psoriasis, but also of rheumatic complaints. The world's monographed in pharmacopoeias drug (among European Pharmacopoeia Ph. Eur and American Pharmacopoeia USP) is generally used in a so-called Zugsalbe in 10 -, 20 - or 50 - percent concentration used as "black ointment ". Your dermatological effect discovered by the German physician Paul Gerson Unna.