Sulfur shows up in more of your daily routine than you’d expect. It’s in the tires on your car, the wine in your glass, the acne cream in your medicine cabinet, and the fertilizer on the farm that grew your food. As one of the most abundant elements on Earth, sulfur and its compounds serve as workhorses across industries ranging from agriculture to medicine to manufacturing. The element’s chemical versatility means it can kill bacteria on your skin, preserve a bottle of wine for years, and make rubber stretchy enough to survive highway speeds, all through different mechanisms.
Turning Rubber Into Something Useful
One of sulfur’s most widespread everyday roles is one most people never think about: making rubber functional. Natural rubber on its own is sticky when warm and brittle when cold, which makes it nearly useless for tires, shoe soles, or gaskets. The process that fixes this, called vulcanization, relies on sulfur. When rubber is heated with sulfur, the sulfur atoms form bridges between the long polymer chains in the rubber, creating a three-dimensional network that gives the material its familiar elasticity and durability.1PubMed Central. Sulfur Vulcanization and Material Properties of Polyhydroxyalkanoates with Unsaturated Side Chain Those crosslinks are why a rubber band snaps back into shape instead of stretching out permanently.
This discovery, dating to the 1840s, arguably launched the modern rubber industry. Today, virtually every rubber product you encounter has been vulcanized with sulfur or a sulfur-containing compound. Car tires are the obvious example, consuming enormous quantities of sulfur globally, but the same chemistry applies to rubber hoses, conveyor belts, O-rings in plumbing, rubber gloves, and the soles of many shoes. Without sulfur crosslinking, none of these products would hold up to repeated flexing, heat, or pressure.
Feeding the World’s Crops
Sulfur is an essential plant nutrient, ranking just behind nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium in importance for crop growth. Plants need it to build certain amino acids and proteins, and a sulfur-starved crop shows it quickly with yellowing leaves and stunted growth. For decades, farms in industrialized countries got plenty of sulfur for free as a side effect of air pollution. Sulfur dioxide from coal-burning power plants would settle onto fields through rain and dry deposition, essentially fertilizing them by accident.
That unintentional fertilizer supply has largely dried up. Cleaner air regulations have cut sulfur dioxide emissions dramatically. In the United States, the amount of plant-available sulfur reaching the soil through natural deposition dropped by somewhere between 34% and 86% across different regions from 2000 to 2020.2ScienceDirect. Revisiting the role of sulfur in crop production: A narrative review Clean air is obviously a good thing, but it means farmers now need to apply sulfur deliberately. Sulfur-containing fertilizers like ammonium sulfate and elemental sulfur have become standard additions to crop management plans, and the choice of which form to use matters. Ammonium sulfate leaches from the soil far more readily than micronized elemental sulfur or clay-bound sulfur formulations, which means the faster-acting forms may not stick around in the root zone as long.2ScienceDirect. Revisiting the role of sulfur in crop production: A narrative review
For you as a consumer, this translates to sulfur being quietly embedded in the cost and quality of staple foods. Crops like canola, wheat, and legumes are especially sulfur-hungry, and if growers don’t supplement their fields, yields and protein content drop. The bread, cooking oil, and lentils in your pantry all depend on sulfur applied at the farm level.
Keeping Wine and Dried Fruit From Going Bad
Open a bottle of wine and there’s a good chance you’re consuming a trace amount of a sulfur compound. Sulfur dioxide has been used in winemaking for centuries as a preservative, and it remains the industry standard because it does three jobs at once. It acts as an antiseptic, an antioxidant, and an antimicrobial agent, all of which help keep wine stable and drinkable during production, aging, and storage.3PubMed Central. Towards Sulphite-Free Winemaking: A New Horizon of Vinification and Maturation Without it, unwanted bacteria and wild yeast can take over a batch, and oxidation can turn a carefully crafted wine brown and flat-tasting within weeks.
Wine isn’t the only food item that relies on sulfur compounds. Sulfites, which are salts derived from sulfur dioxide, are commonly added to dried fruits like apricots and raisins to prevent browning and preserve color. They show up in pickled foods, fruit juices, and some processed meats as well. If you’ve ever noticed the “contains sulfites” warning on a food label, that’s the practical footprint of sulfur chemistry in your grocery basket.
The “natural wine” movement has pushed for sulfite-free or low-sulfite winemaking, which is doable but technically challenging. Sulfur dioxide is hard to replace because no single alternative matches all three of its functions simultaneously. Winemakers experimenting without it tend to face higher spoilage rates and shorter shelf lives, which is why even many organic and biodynamic producers still use small amounts.
Clearing Up Skin Problems
Sulfur has been a go-to ingredient in skin treatments for thousands of years, and it’s still a common active ingredient in over-the-counter products for acne, rosacea, and seborrheic dermatitis. Walk through the skincare aisle of a drugstore and you’ll find sulfur in face washes, spot treatments, masks, and medicated soaps, usually at concentrations between 2% and 10%.
It works on problem skin through two main actions. First, sulfur breaks down the bonds between dead skin cells on the surface, helping to unclog pores and speed up the turnover of the outer skin layer. Second, it has direct antibacterial properties that help control the bacteria contributing to breakouts.4PubMed Central. Sulfur and Its Derivatives in Dermatology: Insights Into Therapeutic Applications—A Narrative Review That combination of exfoliation and germ-killing makes sulfur effective against conditions where both clogged pores and bacteria play a role.
For people with sensitive skin who can’t tolerate more aggressive ingredients like benzoyl peroxide or salicylic acid, sulfur-based products are sometimes a gentler alternative. The trade-off is the smell, which can be unmistakably egg-like, though modern formulations do a better job of masking it. Sulfur also shows up in some prescription-strength treatments for conditions like scabies and certain fungal infections, where its ability to disrupt skin-cell bonds and kill microbes is put to more intensive use.
The Backbone of Early Antibiotics
Before penicillin changed medicine in the 1940s, sulfur-based drugs were the world’s first widely used antibiotics. Sulfonamides, a class of synthetic drugs built around an organo-sulfur chemical structure, became available in the 1930s and were used to treat everything from strep throat to urinary tract infections to wound infections on battlefields.5PubMed Central. Sulfonamide drugs: structure, antibacterial property, toxicity, and biophysical interactions Their broad-spectrum antibacterial activity made them revolutionary at a time when a minor bacterial infection could kill.
Sulfonamides haven’t disappeared from modern medicine. Trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole, commonly sold under brand names like Bactrim, remains a first-line treatment for urinary tract infections and is also used against certain types of pneumonia, particularly in people with compromised immune systems. Other sulfur-containing drugs have moved well beyond antibiotics. The widely used diabetes drug metformin contains sulfur in its molecular structure, as do several blood pressure medications and anti-inflammatory drugs. Sulfur atoms appear in the chemical architecture of many pharmaceuticals because they help molecules bind to specific biological targets or improve how drugs are absorbed in the body.
Even outside of prescription medicine, sulfur compounds have pharmaceutical relevance. Methylsulfonylmethane, often abbreviated as MSM, is a sulfur-containing supplement marketed for joint health and inflammation. Epsom salts, chemically magnesium sulfate, are a staple home remedy for sore muscles, though the sulfur in them isn’t the main active component. The broader point is that sulfur’s chemistry lends itself to an unusually wide range of biological interactions, which is why it keeps showing up across the medicine cabinet.
Fighting Fungus in the Garden
If you grow roses, grapes, squash, or cucumbers, you’ve probably encountered powdery mildew, that white, dusty coating that spreads across leaves and eventually weakens the plant. Sulfur is one of the oldest and most effective fungicides available for home gardeners, and it’s still widely used commercially. Powdery mildew is highly susceptible to sulfur, and sulfur-based sprays and dusts have long been proven effective at controlling the disease during production.6MDPI. Adding Sulfur to Soil Improved Cucumber Plants’ Resistance to Powdery Mildew
For gardeners who want to minimize synthetic chemical use, sulfur is attractive because it’s accepted in most organic certification programs. You can find sulfur-based fungicides at nearly any garden center, sold as wettable sulfur powder, liquid sulfur concentrates, or sulfur dust. Some formulations combine sulfur with beneficial fungi like Trichoderma species for broader disease protection.6MDPI. Adding Sulfur to Soil Improved Cucumber Plants’ Resistance to Powdery Mildew Beyond mildew, sulfur sprays also help manage certain mites and other fungal diseases on fruit trees.
There are a few practical caveats for anyone using sulfur in the garden. It shouldn’t be applied when temperatures are above roughly 90°F (32°C), because sulfur can burn plant tissue in high heat. It also doesn’t mix well with horticultural oil sprays; using both within a couple of weeks of each other risks damaging leaves. And sulfur works best as a preventive, applied before disease shows up or at the first signs. Once a mildew infection is well established, sulfur is less effective at knocking it back.
Sulfur in Water Treatment and Industrial Chemistry
Beyond the products you see and touch directly, sulfur compounds work behind the scenes in municipal water treatment and heavy industry. Sulfuric acid is the single most-produced industrial chemical in the world, and it’s used in so many manufacturing processes that economists have historically treated a country’s sulfuric acid production as a rough indicator of its industrial output. It’s essential for refining petroleum into gasoline and diesel, processing phosphate rock into fertilizer, manufacturing paper, and producing steel.
In water treatment, sulfur-based compounds help remove heavy metals and adjust the pH of drinking water. Aluminum sulfate, for example, is a common coagulant used to clump together fine particles so they can be filtered out. Sulfur dioxide itself is sometimes used to neutralize excess chlorine in treated water before it enters the distribution system. None of these applications are visible to you when you turn on the tap, but they’re part of the infrastructure that makes clean water possible.
Sulfur also plays a role in the batteries being developed for the next generation of electric vehicles. Lithium-sulfur batteries are a major area of research because sulfur is cheap, abundant, and theoretically allows for much higher energy density than the lithium-ion batteries currently in use. These batteries aren’t yet commercially widespread due to challenges with cycle life, but they represent one of the more promising directions in energy storage. If they reach mass production, sulfur will become even more central to everyday technology than it already is.
Why Sulfur Smells So Bad but Does So Much Good
One reason people don’t associate sulfur with everyday life is that their main frame of reference for the element is its smell. Hydrogen sulfide, the gas responsible for the rotten-egg odor of hot springs, sewer gas, and spoiled food, is probably the most culturally prominent sulfur compound. That association gives sulfur a reputation as something unpleasant and niche, when in reality the smelly compounds are a tiny fraction of sulfur chemistry.
Most of the sulfur compounds you interact with daily are odorless or close to it. The sulfur crosslinks in your tires don’t smell. The sulfites in your wine are present at parts-per-million levels and are undetectable by taste or smell for most people. The sulfur in your medications is locked into molecular structures that have no connection to hydrogen sulfide. Even in cases where sulfur does produce a noticeable odor, like in skincare products or garden fungicides, it’s a faint whiff rather than the eye-watering stench of concentrated hydrogen sulfide.
Interestingly, your own body relies on sulfur in ways you don’t notice. Two of the twenty standard amino acids, methionine and cysteine, contain sulfur atoms, and they’re critical for building proteins, enzymes, and connective tissue. The sulfur in your hair and nails contributes to their strength and structure. You take in dietary sulfur every time you eat eggs, garlic, onions, cruciferous vegetables like broccoli, or any protein-rich food. The distinctive sharp flavors of garlic and onion come from sulfur-containing compounds being released when you cut into the cells. So even your dinner plate is a showcase for sulfur chemistry, whether you realize it or not.