Xref: utzoo sci.bio:2341 sci.chem:498 sci.med:12471 Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!wuarchive!husc6!spdcc!dyer From: dyer@spdcc.COM (Steve Dyer) Newsgroups: sci.bio,sci.chem,sci.med Subject: Re: Butane death Message-ID: <4638@ursa-major.SPDCC.COM> Date: 22 Sep 89 13:37:33 GMT References: <89262.194442RAV103@PSUVM.BITNET> <3398@kitty.UUCP> <4633@ursa-major.SPDCC.COM> <3400@kitty.UUCP> Reply-To: dyer@ursa-major.spdcc.COM (Steve Dyer) Organization: S.P. Dyer Computer Consulting, Cambridge MA Lines: 34 In article <3400@kitty.UUCP> larry@kitty.UUCP (Larry Lippman) writes: > Congratulations - you caught me in a typographical error. I had >meant to say "methanehemoglobin" instead of "methemoglobin", which is >entirely different and much more common. > However, my typo had no real bearing on the context of my article, >which would be clear had you included the sentence preceding that which >you quoted: "With respect to direct toxic affects of butane, these may >well be minimal." Larry, you might like to think that this is a game of competition and one-up-manship, but I don't. In any event, I think such a clarification was fairly important, and I'd expect the same if I had made such a statement. An article which claims (even via typo) that methane causes methemoglobinemia certainly deserves a correction. I mean, we're discussing people abusing inhaled hydrocarbons. If someone compares butane to methane (not an unreasonable comparison), and then makes a misstatement about methane, it should be noted. Why would including a conjecture of yours about butane's toxicity make any difference? > In any event, methane does happen to combine with hemoglobin in >a manner analgous to that of carbon monoxide. The chemistry of this must be interesting, since carbon monoxide and methane don't resemble each other bond-wise. I'd always thought that methane was rather inert. Methane is always mentioned in toxicology textbooks as a simple asphyxiant. If it combines with hemoglobin, it must have substantially less affinity than carbon monoxide, or methane would have a much greater reputation for toxicity. -- Steve Dyer dyer@ursa-major.spdcc.com aka {ima,harvard,rayssd,linus,m2c}!spdcc!dyer dyer@arktouros.mit.edu, dyer@hstbme.mit.edu