Vanadium in the living world

Abstract

At the bottom of the Bay of Sevastopol in the Black Sea, in each square mile there is 400 kg of vanadium. The author outlines this interesting chemical phenomenon.

THE BLOOD OF ASCIDIA NIGRA: BLOOD CELL FREQUENCY DISTRIBUTION, MORPHOLOGY, AND THE DISTRIBUTION AND VALENCE OF VANADIUM IN LIVING BLOOD CELLS

“…The openings of the plastic pipette tips were enlarged to prevent damage to the blood cells during the blood withdrawal process. If cell rupture does occur, probably resulting in the release of sulfuric acid, which is found in significant concentrations in the blood cells of other ascidians (Webb, 1939;Endean, 1955Endean, , 1960, the pH is observed to descend as low as 2-3, in agreement with past observations (Bielig, ct al., 1966;Senozan, 1974) and the blood cells become dark green-brown in color. Only blood samples which retained a bright yellow-green color were used for experimentation.…”

“…The vanadium concentrating ability of some tunicate species and their blood cells, particularly those cells which contain the vanadium, have long been the subject of investigation (Senozan, 1974). Theories of the function of this metal have been presented, including its possible roles in oxygen binding (Carlisle, 1968), tunicin synthesis (Endean, 1960) and antimicrobial defenses (Brown and Davies, 1971) ; but as yet there is no widespread agreement supporting one of these suppositions (Goodbody, 1974).…”

Vanadium thiolate chemistry: preparation and structures of [NMe4]Na[VO(SCH2CH2S)2]·2EtOH and [Ph4P]2[V2(SCH2CH2S)4]

“…The structure of the anion of (1) is shown in Figure I . The vanadium atom is in a square pyramidal co-ordination environment, the basal positions being occupied by sulphur atoms S (3,6,7,10) of two bidentate ethanedi thiolate ligands, and the oxygen atom occupying the apex. The molecule thus possesses idealised C,, symmetry.…”

Synthesis and Spectroscopic Characterization of Blue Copper Model Schiff Base Complexes

“…Proteins containing iron(II) or copper(II) are of fundamental importance to the animal life due to their reversible reactions with molecular oxygen 1 . These proteins can bind, transport, store and release dioxygen where required.…”