Baran Invents Time Machine, Returns To 2015 To Report On Maoecrystal V

Boston, MA

To an audience of eager chemists, Professor Phil Baran of the Scripps Institute presented his future self from the year 2019 who in turn presented the results of his present self's eventual optimized total synthesis of maoecrystal v.  Baran, who will have had completed the elegant, 12-step route by late 2018, extolled on the difficulties of the project.

"Optimizing and cutting down on junk steps took almost two full years of work by seven post-docs.  From there, it was a trivial matter of correctly orienting the polarity of several flux capacitors, allowing me to be here with you today," said future-Baran.

Baran did, however, acknowledge some difficulties in implementing his time travel machine.  "It turned out the baryon transistors were exceedingly sensitive to tachyon magnetization.  The result was inconsistent end-points of time travel.  I regret to report that, in the course of debugging, two graduate students were lost, we believe sometime in the mid-to-late cretaceous period."

Upon completion of his talk, the future-present Baran system auto-annihilated, resulting in a singular meta-Baran, which itself transcended both time and mortality, as well as human consciousness.  

All those in attendance were reportedly filled with an overwhelming feeling of tranquility and understanding of the collective human condition. Meta-Baran then disintegrated into pure energy, a sight so beautiful that many were driven insane by the jarring epiphany that nothing in the duration of their metaphysically unimportant lives would ever compare.

As of press time, a small slip in the fabric of space-time had allowed fleeting contact with Professor Yoshito Kishi from the year 2021, who uttered a drawn out "MAIIIITOOOOOTOOOXIIIIIIN" before fading from existence.