scientificpokedex:

Its body is 95% made of gas. Despite lacking substance, it can envelop an opponent of any size and cause suffocation.

We’re doing something a bit different for this post. So since Gastly has some cool physical properties as well as some cool biological properties, Professor Julie and Halie have decided to team up this time!

Professor Julie says:

Gases naturally expand to fill the space that they’re in. By this logic, Gastly would suffocate anyone and everything in the room with it. But, he doesn’t. Gastly appears as an orb of gas, a small poisonous cloud, so how does Gastly keep its shape?

At first, you might think its something like gravity. Just like we’re stuck to the Earth, the little gas particles could be stuck to Gastly. This isn’t practical, especially considering that Gastly ties for the least massive pokemon in the pokedex.

Instead of gravitational field, Gastly must use a similar static electrical field to keep its shape. Opposite charges attract, so if Gastly’s central orb was, say, positively charged, it would keep all negatively charged gas particles close to itself.

Alternatively, think of water. Water molecules like to stick together, which is why you get raindrops and why you can fill a cup over the edge without it spilling over. They do this because water molecules are highly polar. In other words, one side of the molecule is positively charged, and the other side of the molecule is negatively charged. This makes them all attracted to each other.

 If the gas molecules that make up Gastly are polar, they will want to stick together. With that, they would not expand and suffocate everything in the room.

Professor Halie says:

Alrighty, so thanks to Professor Julie we can assume that the molecules that make up Gastly are polar, but there are so many polar molecules out there that doesn’t really help us determine what exactly he is made up of, and as scientists we want to know everything we can. So let’s play detective!

Here is what we know about Gastly’s gas:

• It is polar.
• It is purple.
• It causes suffocation.
• It is sentient. (sorry, we can’t really explain this one)

Let’s take this piece by piece. (Remember, we have to take some creative liberties with these PokeDex entries because taking them literally doesn’t always seem to work.)

What polar gas is purple?
Well, none. The only gas that is known to appear purple is iodine vapor, but Iodine vapor is non-polar. So what we have to assume is that Gastly is mostly composed of some other polar gas with some iodine vapor mixed in, assuming that the two gases don’t react with each other and are able to maintain a stable mixture.

What polar gas can cause suffocation?
Let’s first define suffocate.

SUFFOCATE. transitive verb. 1 a (1) : to stop the respiration of (as by strangling or asphyxiation) (2) : to deprive of oxygen. b : to make uncomfortable by want of fresh air.

We are going to use the second definition for this, because when we get down to the physiological level it gets kind of specific.
Lets assume that Gastly is made up of carbon monoxide. Many of you have probably heard of carbon monoxide, this was used in gas chambers during the holocaust and many people have succumb to carbon dioxide poisoning after prolonged exposure to car exhaust.

When the body is exposed to a lot of carbon monoxide (or CO) it can’t ventilate all of it out of the system and the CO will bind to hemoglobin. Hemoglobin is the protein that carries oxygen throughout the blood to supply it to the different areas of the body, including the brain. The chemical affinity (how much they want to bond) between CO and hemoglobin is way higher than that between oxygen and hemoglobin. The Hemoglobin is going to choose the CO over the oxygen. This causes a problem when the body can’t access oxygen as easily.

Everyone knows that we needs oxygen, but do you know why? So oxygen plays a crucial role in cellular metabolism, and how we make ATP. (Remember my Bulbasaur post? We learned about ATP then, so refer back to that if you need a bit of refreshing on the subject.)

So I think we’ve figured it out!

Gastly is made up of a mixture of Carbon Monoxide and Iodine Vapor, causing his purple hue and his ability to cause suffocation.

Carbon Monoxide is also found in cigarette smoke. So this is your friendly neighborhood Pokemon Professor reminding you kids not to smoke! Also, don’t hang around too many Gastly’s.