Cargando…
Novichoks: The Dangerous Fourth Generation of Chemical Weapons
“Novichoks” is the name given to the controversial chemical weapons supposedly developed in the former Soviet Union between the 1970s and the 1990s. Designed to be undetectable and untreatable, these chemicals became the most toxic of the nerve agents, being very attractive for both terrorist and ch...
Autores principales: | , , , , , |
---|---|
Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
MDPI
2019
|
Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6429166/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30862059 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijms20051222 |
_version_ | 1783405534717673472 |
---|---|
author | Franca, Tanos C. C. Kitagawa, Daniel A. S. Cavalcante, Samir F. de A. da Silva, Jorge A. V. Nepovimova, Eugenie Kuca, Kamil |
author_facet | Franca, Tanos C. C. Kitagawa, Daniel A. S. Cavalcante, Samir F. de A. da Silva, Jorge A. V. Nepovimova, Eugenie Kuca, Kamil |
author_sort | Franca, Tanos C. C. |
collection | PubMed |
description | “Novichoks” is the name given to the controversial chemical weapons supposedly developed in the former Soviet Union between the 1970s and the 1990s. Designed to be undetectable and untreatable, these chemicals became the most toxic of the nerve agents, being very attractive for both terrorist and chemical warfare purposes. However, very little information is available in the literature, and the Russian government did not acknowledge their development. The intent of this review is to provide the IJMS readers with a general overview on what is known about novichoks today. We briefly tell the story of the secret development of these agents, and discuss their synthesis, toxicity, physical-chemical properties, and possible ways of treatment and neutralization. In addition, we also wish to call the attention of the scientific community to the great risks still represented by nerve agents worldwide, and the need to keep constant investments in the development of antidotes and ways to protect against such deadly compounds. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-6429166 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2019 |
publisher | MDPI |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-64291662019-04-10 Novichoks: The Dangerous Fourth Generation of Chemical Weapons Franca, Tanos C. C. Kitagawa, Daniel A. S. Cavalcante, Samir F. de A. da Silva, Jorge A. V. Nepovimova, Eugenie Kuca, Kamil Int J Mol Sci Review “Novichoks” is the name given to the controversial chemical weapons supposedly developed in the former Soviet Union between the 1970s and the 1990s. Designed to be undetectable and untreatable, these chemicals became the most toxic of the nerve agents, being very attractive for both terrorist and chemical warfare purposes. However, very little information is available in the literature, and the Russian government did not acknowledge their development. The intent of this review is to provide the IJMS readers with a general overview on what is known about novichoks today. We briefly tell the story of the secret development of these agents, and discuss their synthesis, toxicity, physical-chemical properties, and possible ways of treatment and neutralization. In addition, we also wish to call the attention of the scientific community to the great risks still represented by nerve agents worldwide, and the need to keep constant investments in the development of antidotes and ways to protect against such deadly compounds. MDPI 2019-03-11 /pmc/articles/PMC6429166/ /pubmed/30862059 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijms20051222 Text en © 2019 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). |
spellingShingle | Review Franca, Tanos C. C. Kitagawa, Daniel A. S. Cavalcante, Samir F. de A. da Silva, Jorge A. V. Nepovimova, Eugenie Kuca, Kamil Novichoks: The Dangerous Fourth Generation of Chemical Weapons |
title | Novichoks: The Dangerous Fourth Generation of Chemical Weapons |
title_full | Novichoks: The Dangerous Fourth Generation of Chemical Weapons |
title_fullStr | Novichoks: The Dangerous Fourth Generation of Chemical Weapons |
title_full_unstemmed | Novichoks: The Dangerous Fourth Generation of Chemical Weapons |
title_short | Novichoks: The Dangerous Fourth Generation of Chemical Weapons |
title_sort | novichoks: the dangerous fourth generation of chemical weapons |
topic | Review |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6429166/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30862059 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijms20051222 |
work_keys_str_mv | AT francatanoscc novichoksthedangerousfourthgenerationofchemicalweapons AT kitagawadanielas novichoksthedangerousfourthgenerationofchemicalweapons AT cavalcantesamirfdea novichoksthedangerousfourthgenerationofchemicalweapons AT dasilvajorgeav novichoksthedangerousfourthgenerationofchemicalweapons AT nepovimovaeugenie novichoksthedangerousfourthgenerationofchemicalweapons AT kucakamil novichoksthedangerousfourthgenerationofchemicalweapons |