Chapter 733: Chapter 733: Silver Coin with a Hole
Because the intelligence on treasure hunting has confirmed that this item is real.
Therefore, Chen Yiyang didn’t ask the historian to check the authenticity of the item again, but decided to investigate by himself to find out what is special about this silver coin.
Thanks to various ancient film and television works, modern people basically know that ancient coins have a square hole in the middle.
If you have a lot of money, you can also thread the coins together with a string, which is called a string of cash.
However, in modern times, even silver coins, which are also currencies, do not have a hole in the middle anymore.
The main reason behind this is the change in minting technology.
In ancient times, copper coins were the main transactional currencies, and having a hole in the middle made it convenient to tie them up with a string for trading.
Additionally, ancient copper coins were directly cast, and after being cast, needed to be clipped and filed smooth by threading them onto a stick.
Therefore, the hole in the middle of ancient coins could only be made square as a circular hole would be difficult to secure.
But by modern times, silver coins became a large denominational currency and were machine-made.
This large denomination currency didn’t need to be strung together with a hole when used in everyday transactions.
Moreover, machine-cast silver coins were finished products when made; forcibly putting a hole would add an extra production step, increasing costs while reducing the yield quality.
Therefore, ideally, modern silver coins from all countries have no holes in the middle.
And among modern countries, only Japan kept the design of a round hole in the middle of their coins after their technology matured.
Though there are always exceptions.
During the Qing Dynasty, when the Qing government imported machines from abroad and started making their silver coins.
Following traditional customs, the first silver coins they designed had a plan to have a square hole in the middle as before.
But this design was abandoned after making some sample coins during initial trials.
Because it was inefficient and costly, there was no need to endure unnecessary hardship.
So, Qing Dynasty silver coins with holes are now very rare.
As long as they are in decent condition, they start at a price of a million at auctions.
This particular holed silver coin Chen Yiyang picked up is a Guangxu Yuanbao with a circular hole and "Ji" word symbol, factory flat five qian coin.
Picture of the holed silver coin.
The silver coin is also a sample mint coin, but the hole in the middle is not square but round.
However, traditionally, a square mold at the edges was made around the round hole.
Chen Yiyang searched for transaction records of this type of silver coin from auction houses and found one similar to his was sold for 2.3 million.
And Chen Yiyang bought this silver coin for just over four hundred yuan.
The stall owner was willing to sell it because he had never seen a silver coin with a hole in the middle and thought it was a modern art piece made from silver replicating ancient ones.
However, as Chen Yiyang was admiring this special silver coin, an assistant knocked on the door.
So Chen Yiyang signaled the assistant to come in.
"Mr. Chen, a local Lin’an laboratory we sponsored previously has made a breakthrough."
?
Chen Yiyang was slightly surprised upon hearing that.
He indeed invested in some laboratories before, but he didn’t expect any returns in the short term.
Unexpectedly, there was this pleasant surprise.
"Which laboratory?" asked Chen Yiyang.
"A chemical lab at the National Science University," the assistant said while handing the documents to Chen Yiyang.
Chen Yiyang took it and glanced over.
It’s hard for a chemical lab to produce results, especially the ones lacking funding and studying unpopular projects.
The probability of achieving results isn’t much higher than winning the jackpot in lottery.
Yet, this particular lab indeed achieved something.
However, after reading the documents, Chen Yiyang felt he had underestimated them.
Because the way they achieved this breakthrough was exceptional.
In the science fiction community, there is a novel called ’Alternate Star Path.’
This book tells this story.
It explores the idea that in the universe, space jump technology is actually a basic technology, no more difficult than creating a cold weapon long sword.
The majority of civilizations in the universe discovered this technology early on and soon began to battle each other, wield various cold weapons and ride warhorses across planets.
But Earth turned out to be an anomaly.
Earth, having picked the wrong technology tree, missed the discovery of space jump technology and instead advanced in other technologies, giving rise to gunpowder, atomic bombs, electrical power, and a suite of modern technologies.
One day, however, an alien civilization still in the cold weapon era discovered Earth.
They naturally utilized space jump technology to arrive on Earth, intending to conquer it.
And then, they were gunned down by Earthlings.
But Earthlings were puzzled—how could these aliens, capable of crossing planets with space jump, still use cold weapons?!
Research revealed that.
Space jump technology was so simple that any cold weapon civilization in the universe could master it, but humans, who had developed into the nuclear era, somehow never figured it out.
Now, humans have mastered space jump technology.
And with tanks and aircraft, they began using space jump technology to conquer the universe.
Colloquially, it’s known as the unleashing of eight billion rabid dogs.
Chen Yiyang always thought that stories like this in science fiction probably wouldn’t exist in reality.
Since if a technology was simple, after a few trials, it should be achievable.
Yet, the Zhang Xiaheng team at National Science University in Lin’an, which he supported, unexpectedly discovered a real-world result similar to space jump technology described in the sci-fi novel.
And the entire human chemical sector had gotten it wrong for a hundred and forty years regarding this achievement!
This all began with a structural unit called aromatic amines.
Aromatic amines are common structural units in numerous pharmaceuticals and new materials.
However, for more than a century, the conversion of aromatic amines in industry required the synthesis of explosive diazonium salt intermediates, generating vast amounts of copper-containing wastewater.
This made the conversion of aromatic amines notoriously hazardous and highly polluting.
Scientists have explored this for over a century without finding an efficient, safe, and economical synthetic pathway.
But Zhang Xiaheng’s team, in a method similar to bomb-making, effortlessly achieved kilogram-scale mass production under ordinary conditions.
Moreover, this method applies to all types of aniline derivatives.
It was an exceedingly simple attempt, simple enough for any chemical research lab with experimental capabilities to reproduce.
The reason other scientists hadn’t thought of this step was that this simple method required creating N-nitroamine before conversion.
And the structure of N-nitroamine is basically used in explosives.
