High valency vanadium compounds

Detection.—Apart from naturally occurring ores of vanadium, vanadium steels, and ferrovanadium, the commonest compounds of vanadium are those which contain the element in the pentavalent state, viz. the pentoxide and the various vanadates. The analytical reactions usually employed are, therefore, those which apply to vanadates. Most vanadium ores can be prepared for the application of these reactions by digesting with mineral acids or by alkaline fusion with the addition of an oxidising agent. When the silica content is high, preliminary treatment with hydrofluoric acid is recommended. Vanadium steels and bronzes, and ferrovanadium, are decomposed by the methods used for other steels the drillings are, for instance, dissolved in sulphuric acid and any insoluble carbides then taken up in nitric acid, or they are filtered off and submitted to an alkaline fusion. Compounds of lower valency are readily converted into vanadates by oxidation with bromine water, sodium peroxide, or potassium permanganate. 

The catalysts are usually prepared in hydrocarbon solvents, essentially in the absence of air or moisture and are mixtures of ill-defined composition. In many instances dark-coloured precipitates are formed of variable stoichiometry containing complexes of the organo-metal compound with the transition metal in a lower valence state. Natta [5] showed that pure lower valence transition metal compounds, such as titanium or vanadium trichloride, when treated with organo-metal compounds were effective catalysts, and were particularly suitable for the preparation of crystalline high melting point polyolefins. The close identity of these two classes of catalyst has led to their description as... 

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