On a gut-response level, natural molecules are assumed more virtuous than synthetic ones, but a quick glance at some toxic mushrooms, snake venoms, and a multitude of plants will convince you this is not true. The truth is, whether a molecule is from a plant, a lab bench, or a rock, it can’t be judged until we know how it behaves

There used to be a doctrine called "vitalism", which held that natural (organic) molecules couldn't be made by man, because they contained some mystic essence or "vital force" that we could not duplicate. In 1828 Friedrich Wohler, a German chemist, used inorganic ammonium cyanate crystals (basically a rock,) to make urea, which is something that organisms make prolifically (it's in urine). Although this disproved vitalism, the notion that synthetically derived molecules are identical to natural ones is still difficult for people to trust.

Modern chemists can make a copy of a naturally occurring molecule, with the exact same structure, in a laboratory. We know the exact, unambiguous structure of the desired molecule, and can duplicate it unerringly. And according to every imaginable test, both in vitro and in vivo, the synthetic version behaves in precisely the same way as a naturally occurring molecule, and this has been verified innumerable times over, since Wohler’s discovery in 1828. It has no "memory" of where it came from, and truly is the same molecule.

So why are we so inclined to trust natural molecules over synthetic ones? Food labelers know this, brandishing the term "natural" on a multitude of products, even though it has no legal meaning. The molecules we make are no less natural than the molecules other animals make. Some of the most feared industrial toxins made by man are also made by plants, and humans have cleverly learned how to make many of the same beneficial molecules plants make, too.

source: HOLLY PHANEUF, PhD. biochemistry professor 

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