ShotBored
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Toxicity in Energetic Materials Using Bioluminescent Inhibition
Here is a paper recently published in the Propellants, Explosives, and Pyrotechnics journal from my idol Thomas Klapötke. It details a testing method
I am familiar with from previous work in environmental chemistry, bioluminescent inhibition for measuring toxicity.
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/prep.202000044
I still think whoever came up with this method, even without applying it to EM toxicity, was a genius of sorts. When under stress, luminescent
bacteria do not release as much light and they managed to correlate these decreases in luminescence to an EC50 value for aquatic toxicity.
By dissolving certain EM common in the pyrotechnic and explosives art, they are able to predict the aquatic toxicity of a variety of materials, most
of which line up closely with their established GHS Hazcom identifiers, and some with a few surprises!
I hope you guys enjoy, I thought this work was fascinating.
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B(a)P
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Thanks for sharing, this is quite amazing and has a lot of potential.
If it can help substitute direct toxicity assessments (DTA), which are currently industry standard this sort of thing it could be a game changer.
DTA is really handy for assessing toxicity of chemicals or mixtures, but often it is prohibitively expensive.
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ShotBored
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Quote: Originally posted by B(a)P  | Thanks for sharing, this is quite amazing and has a lot of potential.
If it can help substitute direct toxicity assessments (DTA), which are currently industry standard this sort of thing it could be a game changer.
DTA is really handy for assessing toxicity of chemicals or mixtures, but often it is prohibitively expensive. |
Exactly what I was thinking! I never conducted the test, but where I worked used Bioluminescent Toxicity testing for groundwater and water treatment
facilities and I always thought it was super interesting, though my understanding of the biological systems at play is definitely lacking.
With the current EU and US move towards eliminating highly toxic materials from EM, I could almost see this type of testing becoming a part of the EM
approvals process 20-30 years down the road, if not sooner. Maybe the implementation of this type of testing into an ASTM, STANAG, MIL-SPEC or ISO
method would drive this change sooner. Sounds like an opportunity for a venturing chemist somewhere to set up the testing facilities for this to me
haha.
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nitro-genes
International Hazard
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It might be a good proxy for overall environmental toxicity indeed. The toxicity in the case of a microorganism is probably mainly a function of the
molecules reactivity, size, and polarity (how easily it passes the cell membrane), apart from specific interactions with biological/enzymatic
processes in the cell itself. Vibrio Fischeri is a faculattve anaerobe, probably can't deal very well with all these oxidative high nitrogen molecules
anyway. Curious what hydrogen peroxide or sodium nitrite would have done.
Speaking of microorganisms and energetic materials:
https://www.serdp-estcp.org/content/download/46735/436861/fi...
Quite amazing to see the proposed formation of N-nitroglcyine from the amino acid glycine by some Streptomyces species, a true high explosive!
Formation of nitric oxides from ammonia is well described for several bacteria, though a nitramine?! Maybe through some isomerization of an NO derived
diazeniium diolate? Curious which enzymes would be responsible. If this occurs like this, the reverse enzymatic process could be interesting as well
seen the therapeutic importance of diazenium diolates as NO donors. 
[Edited on 26-10-2020 by nitro-genes]
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ShotBored
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| Quote: Originally posted by nitro-genes | It might be a good proxy for overall environmental toxicity indeed. The toxicity in the case of a microorganism is probably mainly a function of the
molecules reactivity, size, and polarity (how easily it passes the cell membrane), apart from specific interactions with biological/enzymatic
processes in the cell itself. Vibrio Fischeri is a faculattve anaerobe, probably can't deal very well with all these oxidative high nitrogen molecules
anyway. Curious what hydrogen peroxide or sodium nitrite would have done.
Speaking of microorganisms and energetic materials:
https://www.serdp-estcp.org/content/download/46735/436861/fi...
Quite amazing to see the proposed formation of N-nitroglcyine from the amino acid glycine by some Streptomyces species, a true high explosive!
Formation of nitric oxides from ammonia is well described for several bacteria, though a nitramine?! Maybe through some isomerization of an NO derived
diazeniium diolate? Curious which enzymes would be responsible. If this occurs like this, the reverse enzymatic process could be interesting as well
seen the therapeutic importance of diazenium diolates as NO donors.
[Edited on 26-10-2020 by nitro-genes] |
My biochemistry is wayyyyy lacking...but naturally generated high explosives? You have my attention sir...
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