| Abstract
| - Clinical chelation therapy of mercury poisoning generally uses one or both of two drugsmeso-dimercaptosuccinic acid (DMSA) and dimercaptopropanesulfonic acid (DMPS), commercially sold as Chemet and Dimaval, respectively. We have used a combination of mercuryLIII-edge X-ray absorption spectroscopy and density functional theory calculations to investigatethe chemistry of interaction of mercuric ions with each of these chelation therapy drugs. Weshow that neither DMSA nor DMPS forms a true chelate complex with mercuric ions and thatthese drugs should be considered suboptimal for their clinical task of binding mercuric ions.We discuss the design criteria for a mercuric specific chelator molecule or “custom chelator”,which might form the basis for an improved clinical treatment.
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