ALBERT

Notes: Abstract An experimental study of the solubility of Pt and Pd sulfides and Au metal in aqueous bisulfide solutions was conducted at temperatures from 200° to 350 °C and at saturated vapor pressure. A 500-mL Bridgemantype pressure vessel constructed of titanium, and equipped with a motor-driven magnetic stirrer was employed. The pH and the oxidation state were buffered by the coexistence of H2S/HS−/SO inf4 sup2− . The pH at temperature was calculated to be in the range 5.91–9.43, and ∑S was 0.3–2.2 m. Under the experimental conditions, the measured solubility of gold is about two to three orders of magnitude greater than that of either platinum and palladium, and the measured solubility of platinum is, in general, approximately equal to that of palladium, in molal units. The solubilities are found to be in the range: platinum 4–800 ppb, palladium 1–400 ppb, and gold 2–300 ppm. The solubility data can be modeled adequately using the following reactions: Au+H2S+HH−=Au(HS) 2 − +1/2H2 (K14); PtS+HS−+H+=Pt (HS) 2 0 (K15); PdS+HS−+H+=Pd (HS) 2 0 (K16); PtS2+H2=Pt (HS) 2 0 (K21). With equilibrium constants determined as follows (errors represent two standard deviations): Preliminary measurements of the solubilities of metallic Pt, Pd and Au as hydroxide complexes were also conducted using a second titanium pressure vessel, at temperatures of 200° to 350 °C and vapor saturation pressure, with pH and the oxidation state controlled or buffered by adding known amounts of NaOH and H2 gas. The concentration of NaOH was in the range 0.01–1.3 m, and the partial pressure of H2 at 200 °C was 62–275 bars, initially. Under the temperature and pressure conditions of these experiments, the solubility of platinum in 1 m NaOH solution is less than 100 ppb, that of palladium is less than 10 ppb and that of gold is less than 0.2 ppm; and in 0.01 m NaOH solutions, both Pt and Pd solubilities are less than 1 ppb. These data indicate that the contributions of hydroxide complexes to the total solubilities in the bisulfide runs, where the pH was in the range of 5.9–9.4, are negligible. The concentrations of both Pt and Pd as bisulfide complexes in the Salton Sea geothermal system predicted using the stability constants determined in this work agree very well with those values measured by McKibben et al. (1990). This calculation strongly suggests that the PGE are transported in moderately reducing, near neutral hydrothermal fluids as bisulfide complexes, as is gold. However, the much lower maximum solubility of the PGE relative to gold severely constrains models of re genesis, and may explain the relative rarity of hydrothermal PGE deposits compared to the relative abundance of hydrothermal Au deposits.

Notes: Abstract Two sets of measurements of the solubility of Pt and Pd in bisulfide solutions have been carried out at low temperatures. The first involved the equilibration of Pt metal with bisulfide solutions at 25 °C and pH = 6–12 for periods up to five years. These experiments yielded Pt concentrations on the order of tens of μg/L at sulfide concentrations as low as 0.001 molal under conditions too reducing to permit significant contributions from hydroxide complexes. The second set of experiments consisted of reacting PtS, PdS and Au with H2S-saturated solutions having pH values of 3–4 at 25°, 50° and 90 °C. These experiments showed that the solubilities of all three metals increased with temperature. The observed order of solubility was Au 〉 Pt ≈ Pd. Solubilities ranged from 10 to 75 μg/L Au, 4 to 20 μg/L Pt and 0.5 to 10 μg/L Pd. The data do not permit definitive identification of the Pt and Pd species present in either set of experiments, but do strongly suggest that the species present under acidic and basic conditions are different. The measured solubility of gold at 25° and 50 °C is consistent with that measured in previous studies. Although the measured Pt and Pd solubilities are not as high as those estimated by theoretical methods, it is nevertheless evident that bisulfide complexation can lead to the remobilization of Pt and Pd over a wide range of pH under reducing conditions at geologically reasonable sulfide concentrations, at low as well as high temperatures. Such conditions are characteristic of a wide variety of geological environments where Pt and Pd have been inferred to have been affected by hydrothermal transport. In these cases, bisulfide complexation is far more effective than chloride or hydroxide complexes in transporting the PGE.

Notes: Affinity-purified amaryllis lectin was used to grow single crystals using the hanging-drop method. The space group was found to be C2 with unit-cell dimensions a = 73.4 (1), b = 100.3 (1), c = 62.2 (1) Å and β = 137.3 (2)°. Data to 2.25 Å resolution have been recorded and solution of the structure is currently underway by means of molecular-replacement techniques.

Notes: The pyruvate-stimulated adenylate cyclase from Brevibacterium liquefaciens produces up to 450μM cyclic AMP in the culture medium when the bacterium is grown on glucose and alanine. In this paper we report the cloning, expression and sequencing of the gene for this enzyme. Residues were identified, within the C-terminal domain, which are conserved in adenylate and guanylate cyclase sequences from eukaryotes and in the adenylate cyclase of the prokaryote Rhizobium meliloti. We have also identified a sequence of 30 residues near the N-terminus of the protein which is homologous to part of the regulatory domain of the cellular homologues of the oncogenes fes and fps; this sequence is also present in the avian Fujinami sarcoma virus fps gene.

Notes: Résumé Quelques propriétés respiratoires du sang de la raie (Raia clavata) ont été déterminées avec des échantillons de cathéter intravasculaire. Chaque échantillon était utilisé seulement pour deux points de la courbe de dissociation −O2−, parce que les propriétés changent après une demie-heure. On a constaté un effet de Bohr (Δ log P50/Δ pH=−0.25±0.03) ainsi que celui d'Haldane.