Inert Gas xenon is present in atmospheric air, but unfortunately in a very low amounts. It is possible to say that average room have about 2-5 ml of xenon. Xenon was discovered by studying of evaporation of liquid gases carried by William Ramsay and Morris Travers. After evaporation of liquid atmospheric gas, which contains helium, hydrogen, neon, oxygen, nitrogen and argon a very small amount of liquid remaining was left in cry vessel. This liquid was krypton gas, but after evaporation a very tiny amount of other gas was left. This gas was named as xenon from a Greek word meaning "strange one" or "stranger". This gas emitted very unusual white light with full spectrum, from orange to violet. This light emittance activated by electrical discharge can be explained by very big electron cloud of xenon, which contains 54 electrons.
Very wide spectrum of xenon gas emittance, from infra-red to ultraviolet, activated by electrical discharge in demand in many industrial applications. Xenon gas is used for production of high pressure light bulbs. The high pressure lamps are used for production of extremely intensive full spectrum light, from infra-red to ultraviolet. This light is used in orthochromatic fabric and paint industry.
Another interesting application of xenon gas was discovered recently in completely new research field. Xenon molecules can be very hydrophobic and easily can bind with hydrophobic parts of protein molecules. According last researches this binding can take place only at pressures of more than 70 psi. Xenon molecule is very electron rich and therefore these atoms can significantly change x-ray diffraction pattern of protein crystals without significant changes of its molecular structure. This fact now widely used in protein crystallography as one of technique of solving protein structure. 57 protein structures were solved with xenon. Coordinates for all these structures are submitted into protein data bank and everybody can look through these beautiful results. For convenience we prepare all pictures (normal and stereo view) of all xenon binding sites available in RCSB data bank now.
Xenon atoms absorbs x-ray very well. As a noble gas, xenon is absolutely harmless for living organisms and therefore this gas can be used in x-ray diagnostic medicine.
Recent studies shows that in high concentrations xenon can act as anaesthetic by inhibiting of membrane calcium pumps with consequent inhibition of spinal dorsal horn neurons. Recently xenon considered as potential candidate for surgery as an anaesthetic agent due to significant reduction of production price with consequent anaesthetic price of about 1300 GBP per hour of deep anaesthesia.
![[Valid RSS feed]](http://www.freebie-articles.com/images/rss.gif "XML Feed For RSS")
Category Rss Feed
Print This Article
Add To Favorites