Editing Gutta-percha (section)

====Electrical====
Gutta-percha latex is biologically [[Chemically inert|inert]], resilient, and is a good electrical insulator with a high [[dielectric strength]].<ref name = "bdm">{{cite book |last1=Manappallil |first1=John J. |title=Basic Dental Materials |date=30 November 2015 |publisher=JP Medical Ltd |isbn=978-93-5250-048-2 |page=219 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7cAqCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA219 |language=en}}</ref>

[[Michael Faraday]] discovered its value as an insulator soon after the introduction of the material to Britain in 1843.<ref>{{cite book|title=The Atlantic Telegraph: Its History, from the Commencement of the Undertaking in 1854, to the Sailing of the "Great Eastern" in 1866.| publisher=Bacon and Company | year=1866| page=108|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=CwszAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA108}}</ref> Allowing this fluid to evaporate and coagulate in the sun produced a latex which could be made flexible again with hot water, but which did not become brittle, unlike [[rubber]] prior to the discovery of [[vulcanization]].{{citation needed|date=November 2016}}

By 1845, telegraph wires insulated with gutta-percha were being manufactured in the UK. It served as the insulating material for early undersea telegraph cables, including the first [[transatlantic telegraph cable]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Schlesinger |first1=Henry |title=The battery how portable power sparked a technological revolution |date=2010 |publisher=HarperCollins e-books |location=New York |isbn=9780061985294}}</ref> The material was a major constituent of [[Chatterton's compound]]<ref>{{cite book |last1=Prescott |first1=George Bartlett |title=Electricity and the Electric Telegraph |date=1881 |publisher=D. Appleton |page=956 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YbhLAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA956 |language=en}}</ref> used as an [[electrical insulation|insulating sealant]] for telegraph and other electrical cables.{{citation needed|date=November 2016}}

The dielectric constant of dried gutta-percha ranges from 2.56 to 3.01.  Resistivity of dried gutta-percha ranges from {{val|25e14}} to {{val|370e14|u=Ω⋅cm}}. <ref> {{cite report |author=Curtis, H.L. |title=Dielectric Constant, Power Factor and Resistivity of Rubber and Gutta_Percha |url=https://nvlpubs.nist.gov/nistpubs/nbstechnologic/nbstechnologicpaperT299.pdf |publisher=United States N.I.S.T. }}</ref>

Since about 1940, [[polyethylene]] has supplanted gutta-percha as an electrical insulator.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Aitken |first1=Frederic |last2=Foulc |first2=Jean-Numa |title=From Deep Sea to Laboratory 1: The First Explorations of the Deep Sea by H.M.S. Challenger (1872-1876) |date=30 April 2019 |publisher=John Wiley & Sons |isbn=978-1-78630-374-5 |page=20 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5WWRDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA20 |language=en}}</ref>