Nigel Braun (born: September 7, 1991), better known online as NileRed, is a Canadian chemist and science communicator known for his videos in which he conducts various chemical experiments.
Academic background[]
Nigel has a BSC in Biochemistry with a minor in Pharmacology. After finishing his degree, he worked as a lab tech in an organic lab and took post-graduate studies in applied chemistry. He however ended up leaving his post-graduate studies early to focus on his YouTube channel.
Channel origins & content[]
Nigel started NileRed on March 10, 2014. He decided to start a chemistry channel because he felt that chemistry is often taught poorly in most schools, leading to people not being interested in or even hating chemistry. His earliest still up video was posted in March 24, 2014, demonstrating the Pharaoh's Serpent firework. This video went viral and immediately put his channel on the educational YouTube scene.
Nigel focuses on chemical reactions that are weird and not well known by non-scientific peoples. He explains the reactions with chemical diagrams and by recording his experiments.
All of his early videos took place in either his university's labs or his parents' garage. In 2018 he moved into his own house which has an office and professional chemistry lab.
In his most recent video, he made styrofoam into cinnamon flavouring, and making an apple taste like a grape.
Trivia[]
- His oldest videos were removed because they keep getting flagged and striked by YouTube.
- He also took business classes but failed them.
- A long running gag is that his favorite chemicals and reactions are all extremely dangerous.
- He built his lab in his house with his dad.
- His brother and friends work with him in his lab.
- He is insensitive to strong smells, as shown when he created Thioacetone (supposedly the smelliest chemical known) and only brushed it off as smelling "not that bad".
- He is of German and Japanese descent.
- His icons are variations of the Belousov–Zhabotinsky reaction.
- While it is yet to be confirmed, fans speculate that his channel is named after the lipophilic stain.