THE OTHER GROUP 5A ELEMENTS P, As, Sb, AND Bi

During the 1870s an interesting observation was made J in Alfred Nobel s dynamite factories. Workers who 

As useful as nitroglycerin is to this day in treating angina pectoris, it has a limitation in that prolonged administration results in development of tolerance, or desensitization, of the vascular muscle to further vasorelaxation by nitroglycerin. The bioactivation of nitroglycerin is the subject of active research in the hope that a means of circumventing desensitization can be found. 

Of the other group 5A elements— phosphorus, arsenic, antimony, and bismuth— phosphorus has a central role in several aspects of biochemistry and environmental chemistr)  

Some properties of the group 5A elements are listed in T Table 22.7. The general pattern is similar to what we saw with other groups Size and metallic character increase as atomic number increases in the group. 

The variation in properties among group 5A elements is more striking than that seen in groups 6A and 7A. Nitrogen at the one extreme exists as a gaseous diatomic molecule, clearly nonmetallic. At the other extreme, bismuth is a reddish white, metallic-looking substance that has most of the characteristics of a metal. 

---

THE OTHER GROUP 5A ELEMENTS P, As, Sb, AND Bi Of the other members of group 5A (P, As, Sb, and Bi), we take a closer look at phosphorus—the most commercially important one and the only one that plays an important and ben cial role in biological systems. 

---