Bioinorganic chemistry

Bioinorganic chemistry studies the role of metals in biology. It also studies natural phenomena such as the behaviour of metalloproteins and artificially introduced metals in medicine and toxicology. Many biological processes such as respiration depend on some inorganic molecules. Bioinorganic chemistry also includes the study of inorganic models or mimics that imitate the way metalloproteins work.
It is a mix of biochemistry and inorganic chemistry. Bioinorganic chemistry studies the implications for biology of electron-transfer proteins, substrate bindings and activation, atom and group chemistry as well as metal properties.
History.
Paul Ehrlich used organoarsenic (“arsenicals”) for the treatment of syphilis. This demonstrated the relevance of metals, or at least metalloids, to medicine. Then Rosenberg discovered the anti-cancer activity of cisplatin (cis-PtCl2(NH3)2). The first protein ever crystallized was urease. This has nickel at its active site. Vitamin B12, the cure for pernicious anemia, was shown by crystallography by Dorothy Hodgkin to have a cobalt atom in a corrin macrocycle. The Watson-Crick structure for DNA demonstrated the key structural role played by phosphate-containing polymers.
Research areas.
Some areas of interest in research are: