The candles in the meeting room were lit, their flames dancing across the glass vessels and casting the solemn faces of everyone present into relief.
The discussion of the new explosive continued until sunset.
Three bottles of dangerous compounds still lay quietly on the table, but everyone's gaze eventually returned to the bottle of grayish-yellow picric acid.
"It has the greatest power." Professor Wells lightly tapped the container of picric acid with a pair of tweezers and said in a steady voice, "And its raw materials are easy to obtain—saltpeter, sulfur, and phenol. We have stable supplies of all three. The problem isn't production, but how to tame it."
"The key is preventing it from coming into contact with metal." Tennyson Fadeyev quickly flipped open his notebook, which was densely packed with experimental data. "If we want to use it for military purposes, we can store it in wooden crates lined with ceramic. During transport, we must keep it dry while isolating it from metal components. The fuse system must also use nonmetallic materials, such as hardened rubber or specially made ceramic tubes."
Marco Webster nodded. "We could also add inert fillers to the picric acid, such as fine sand or graphite powder, to reduce its sensitivity. It would be similar to the way we add water to black powder, except this time we're 'diluting' its power in exchange for stability."
"But that would reduce its explosive efficiency." Hoffman frowned. "We're already pursuing high power per unit of volume. Adding impurities would increase the amount needed to collapse a tunnel."
"Then let's change our approach." Derson suddenly spoke up, his gaze sharp. "Could we activate it only immediately before use? For example, transport it as a safe precursor compound, then convert it into picric acid at the site?"
Everyone froze.