Soap and detergent | chemical compound | Britannica
The first detergent (or surface-active agent) was soap. In a strictly chemical sense, any compound formed by the reaction of a water-insoluble fatty acid with an organic base or an alkali metal may be called a soap. Practically, however, the soap industry is concerned mainly with those water-soluble soaps that result from the interaction between fatty acids and alkali metals.
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