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diethylmercury
Sign in to saveAlso known as diethyl mercury
Diethylmercury is a flammable, colorless liquid, and one of the strongest known neurotoxins. This organomercury compound is described as having a slightly sweet smell, though inhaling enough fumes to notice this would be deadly. This chemical can cross the blood–brain barrier, causing permanent brain damage. It is, however, considerably less toxic than dimethylmercury.
Chemical data
- Formula
- C4H10Hg
- Molecular weight
- 258.71 g/mol
- IUPAC name
- diethylmercury
- SMILES
- CC[Hg]CC
- InChIKey
- SPIUPAOJDZNUJH-UHFFFAOYSA-N
- Polar surface area
- 0 Ų
- H-bond donors
- 0
- H-bond acceptors
- 0
- Formal charge
- 0
via PubChem
Wikidata facts
- Subclass of
- chemical compound
- Has part
- hydrogen
- Mass
- 260.049
Show 3 more facts
- chemical formula
- C₄H₁₀Hg
- canonical SMILES
- CC[Hg]CC
- Commons category
- Diethylmercury
Sources (2)
via Wikidata · CC0
~1 min read
Encyclopedic overview
3 sectionsContents
- Synthesis
- See also
- References
Diethylmercury is a flammable, colorless liquid, and one of the strongest known neurotoxins. This organomercury compound is described as having a slightly sweet smell, though inhaling enough fumes to notice this would be deadly. This chemical can cross the blood–brain barrier, causing permanent brain damage. It is, however, considerably less toxic than dimethylmercury.
The resulting (CH3CH2)2Hg is a dense liquid (2.466 g/cm3) that boils at 58 °C at 16 torr. This extremely toxic compound is slightly soluble in ethanol and soluble in ether.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “diethylmercury” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.