Nerve agents, physical/chemical properties

Carbamate Nerve Agents may be liquids or solids and have little or no odor. Various solvents can be added to dilute the agents changing both their appearance and physical/chemical properties. Solvents may also dramatically increase the rate that agents penetrate the skin. 

TABLE 6.1. Physical and chemical properties of organophosphorous nerve agents... 

TABLE I. Chemical and Physical Properties of Nerve Agents ... 

Molecular models of the nerve agents tabun, sarin, soman, and VX are shown in Figure 5-3. Table 5-3 summarizes the chemical, physical, environmental and biological properties of these compounds. 

CHEMICAL, PHYSICAL, ENVIRONMENTAL, AND BIOLOGICAL PROPERTIES OF NERVE AGENTS... 

The physical properties of chemical agents are highly variable. They range from nerve agent vapor, which usually dissipates in a few minutes to a few hours, to vesicants such as mustard, which can remain active for weeks (or in some cases, years buried and recovered World War I mustard projectiles are often still quite toxic). It is imperative, then, that timely decontamination of the skin and personal equipment that has been exposed to agent, especially liquid agent, be completed. Skin decontamination should take place within 2 minutes if possible, and equipment decontamination should be completed within 1 hour. 

Chemicals such as mustard (a blister agent) and sarin (a nerve agent) can form toxic vapors at room temperature. Agents that share this physical property could be employed in crude but still very deadly attacks without sophisticated dispersal devices. Other, more viscous compounds such as VX are much less prone to evaporation even at higher temperatures, and for this reason present more of a hazard as a skin contaminant. 

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