Oxygen mobility, high temperature

The alcohol is a mobile liquid, light in colour, with a boiling point of 170°C. It is very reactive and will resinify if exposed to high temperatures, acidity, air or oxygen. Organic bases such as piperidine and n-butylamine are useful inhibitors. 

There are several environmentally significant mercury species. In the lithosphere, mercury is present primarily in the +II oxidation state as the very insoluble mineral cirmabar (HgS), as a minor constituent in other sulfide ores, bound to the surfaces of other minerals such as oxides, or bound to organic matter. In soil, biological reduction apparently is primarily responsible for the formation of mercury metal, which can then be volatilized. Metallic mercury is also thought to be the primary form emitted in high-temperature industrial processes. The insolubility of cinnabar probably limits the direct mobilization of mercury where this mineral occurs, but oxidation of the sulfide in oxygenated water can allow mercury to become available and participate in other reactions, including bacterial transformations. 

An entirely different selectivity principle known as phase equilibrium comes into play in high-temperature ionic conductors. Many important gases dissolve in ionic solids at elevated temperatures. However, the solubility is rather sharply defined for the gas and the solid by the lattice parameters and the size of the gas molecule. The best example is the solubility of oxygen in zirconium dioxide. When Z1O2 is doped with yttrium ions, it exhibits a high mobility for the O anion. The solubility and anion mobility then become the basis for several electrochemical gas sensors, using yttria-stabilized zirconia (YSZ). 

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