New Google doodle marks 151st birthday of Wilbur Scoville who invented pepper heat scale

Google has commemorated the 151st anniversary of the birthday of Wilbur Scoville, the first person to measure the heat of a pepper.

Born in Bridgeport Connecticut on 22 January, 1865, Wilbur Lincoln Scoville was a chemist, award-winning researcher, professor of pharmacology and the second vice-chairman of the American Pharmaceutical Association.

His book, The Art of Compounding, makes one of the earliest mentions of milk as an antidote for pepper heat.

The Google doodle is an interactive representation of the Scoville heat scale that he developed in 1912. It measures the hotness of chilli pepper and hot sauce in the year.

Before the organoleptic test using human testers to measure pungency in peppers, no one knew how to measure the tear-inducing properties of pepper. The Scoville Organoleptic Test has been now standardized as the Scoville scale.

The doodle shows Scoville holding pepper with the backdrop of different kinds of peppers. The word Google has been spelled making use of the tongue-burning chilli pepper.

On clicking the fiery play button the Google doodle then starts an interactive session giving you the chance to play a game to know the heat properties of bell pepper jalapeno pepper and cayenne pepper.

The hottest pepper in the world is the Carolina reaper, which measures at 1.6m Scoville units, which is 1,600 times hotter than a jalapeno.