Bacterial inorganic chemistry

Physical chemistry too saw very few changes in personnel or in research topics until the closing years of Hinshelwood s time, 1960-65, which are treated in the next section. As described earlier, he continued his work in kinetics of gas reactions and bacterial growth. He had assistants, C.J. Danby (1945), A.R.C. Dean (1955) and B.A. Coles (1960) but he did not exert great pressure for new appointments especially after 1955. H.W. Thompson and L.E. Sutton, also mentioned earlier had been moved to the 1941 laboratory from inorganic chemistry and from organic chemistry, respectively, but their dates of... 

Enzymatic detoxification was determined to be the major resistance mechanism in all species of mercury-resistant bacteria. For example, mercuric reductase was essential for volatilization of Hg from Hg + and various organomercurial hydrolases were responsible for volatilization of methane (CH4) from methylmercury, for ethane (C2H4) from ethylmercury, and for benzene from phenylmercury. Minamata Bay bacterial isolates can also volatilize Hg from added inorganic and organic mercurials. Genes which govern the chemistry of mercury detoxification were abundant in bacteria found in Minamata Bay and other mercury-polluted sites these genetic strains of mercury-resistant bacteria show promise for bioremediation of mercury pollution. 

Sediments can be sources of toxicants and are an important consideration in toxicological chemistry. Although heavy metal sulfides such as PbS and CdS are removed from water into sediments, when the sediments are stirred up the sulfides can be oxidized to toxic soluble forms. The dense, toxic pollutants polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) have accumulated in Hudson River sediments as discussed in Chapter 4, Section 4.12. As noted in Section 3.11, anoxic bacterial processes in sediments may convert insoluble inorganic mercury to mobile methylmercury compounds that contaminate fish tissue. Bottom-feeding organisms may bioaccumulate metal and organic pollutants that have accumulated in sediments. 

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