Oxygen carriers discovery

The first suggestion of a possible biochemical function for vanadium came from the discovery that vanadocytes, the green blood cells of tunicates (sea squirts), contain 1.0 M V(III) and 1.5-2 M H2S04. 613 It was proposed that a V-containing protein is an oxygen carrier. However, the V3+ appears not to be associated with proteins612 and it does not carry 02. 

The story of metal complexes able to bind Oj reversibly begins with the discovery in 1938 that certain 0,N-chelates (Schiff bases) of cobalt(II) are oxygen carriers, to be joined in 1963 by Ir(PPh3)2(CO)(Cl) which reversibly adds O2 . Other low valent Pt... 

Noble Gas-Oxygen Compounds. Since the discovery in 1962 that the noble gases are not truly chemically inert, propellant chemists became intrigued with the possibility that they could serve as excellent carriers of oxygen (and fluorine) and thus generate a new family of chemical propellants. While the importance of this discovery to chemistry cannot be underestimated, so far it has not led to the preparation of new compounds as significant rocket oxidizers. 

The true nature of oxidative phosphorylation, i.e. the synthesis of ATP linked to the transfer of electrons along a chain of electron (or hydrogen) carriers, was emphasized by the discovery of photosynthetic phosphorylation in chloroplasts by Arnon in 1954.< > Here neither oxidizable substrates nor oxygen play a role. Electrons derived from the photolytic cleavage of water are fed into an electron-transfer chain and withdrawn at the other end of the chain by the oxidizing equivalents formed by the photolytic reaction. 

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