Cheesecloth, Egg White, and Paper: What the Samples Actually Were

Every occasion on which a sample of claimed ectoplasm was obtained and subjected to actual chemical or microscopic analysis identified it as ordinary material. Psychical researcher Harry Price, investigating the Scottish medium Helen Duncan in 1931, obtained a sample and had it analysed by a chemist, who found it consisted of cheesecloth mixed with egg white and other mundane chemicals, consistent with material swallowed before a séance and regurgitated during it.

Researcher Eric Dingwall's later analysis of ectoplasm samples from Schrenck-Notzing's star subject, Eva C., found paper, cotton, and human hair, and separate examination of some of Schrenck-Notzing's published photographs found the "materialised" faces were two-dimensional and matched images that had previously appeared in printed magazines, suggesting cut-out pictures had been used rather than any three-dimensional substance. Schrenck-Notzing's investigative conditions have themselves been criticised as inadequate, dim lighting and no thorough physical search of the medium before sittings, weaknesses that made the production of concealed material straightforward. No sample of claimed ectoplasm has ever been identified, under proper analysis, as anything other than ordinary textile, food, or paper material consistent with concealment and regurgitation by the medium.