The 23-year-old chemist who revolutionized leprosy treatment before her life was cut short

Science · Published 8 October 2026 Swipe more like this →

In short: For centuries, leprosy treatment was a painful, ineffective struggle. Then, Alice Ball, a brilliant young chemist, discovered a way to make chaulmoogra oil injectable and absorbable. Her breakthrough saved hundreds from hospital isolation, yet for decades, a male colleague took the credit for her life's work.

In 1915, Alice Ball, a chemist at the College of Hawaiʻi, solved a long-standing pharmacological crisis. While chaulmoogra oil had been used in traditional Asian medicine for centuries, its application in Western medicine was deeply flawed. Oral administration caused severe gastrointestinal distress, and the oil's high viscosity made injections incredibly painful and inconsistent. Ball’s genius was in chemically modifying the oil's active components to enhance bioavailability. By extracting ethyl esters from the fatty acids, she created a water-soluble formulation that could be safely injected and absorbed by the body.

This breakthrough, known as the 'Ball Method,' provided the first viable treatment for Hansen’s disease, allowing hundreds of patients to be discharged from hospitals. The treatment remained a primary defense against the disease until the introduction of sulfone antibiotics in the 1940s. The method worked by utilizing the oil's unique cyclopentenyl fatty acids to interfere with the bacterium's ability to synthesize its essential fatty capsule.

Tragically, Ball died in 1916 at the age of 24, before she could publish her findings. After she passed away, her associate, Arthur Lyman Dean, claimed her findings as his own, renaming the technique the 'Dean Method'. Dean’s version involved only a slight modification using vacuum distillation—a step later criticized by physicians. It has taken decades of dedicated research to restore Ball's legacy as the first African American and first woman to earn a master's degree from her university and the true architect of this medical milestone.

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