Uses of Carbon monoxide

Carbon monoxide (CO), also called carbonous oxide, is a colorless, odorless, and tasteless gas that is slightly lighter than air. It can be toxic to humans and animals when encountered in higher concentrations, although it is also produced in normal animal metabolism in low quantities, and is thought to have some normal biological functions. In the atmosphere however, it is short lived and spatially variable, since it combines with oxygen to form carbon dioxide and ozone.
Carbon monoxide consists of one carbon atom and one oxygen atom, connected by a triple bond that consists of two covalent bonds as well as one dative covalent bond. It is the simplest oxocarbon. In coordination complexes the carbon monoxide ligand is called carbonyl.
Carbon monoxide is produced from the partial oxidation of carbon-containing compounds; it forms when there is not enough oxygen to produce carbon dioxide (CO2), such as when operating a stove or an internal combustion engine in an enclosed space. In the presence of oxygen, carbon monoxide burns with a blue flame, producing carbon dioxide. Coal gas, which was widely used before the 1960s for domestic lighting, cooking, and heating, had carbon monoxide as a significant constituent. Some processes in modern technology, such as iron smelting, still produce carbon monoxide as a byproduct.
Uses
Chemical industry
Carbon monoxide is an industrial gas that has many applications in bulk chemicals manufacturing.
Large quantities of aldehydes are produced by the hydroformylation reaction of alkenes, carbon monoxide, and H2. Hydroformylation is coupled to the Shell Higher Olefin Process to give precursors to detergents. Methanol is produced by the hydrogenation of carbon monoxide. In a related reaction, the hydrogenation of carbon monoxide is coupled to C-C bond formation, as in the Fischer-Tropsch process where carbon monoxide is hydrogenated to liquid hydrocarbon fuels. This technology allows coal or biomass to be converted to diesel.
In the Monsanto process, carbon monoxide and methanol react in the presence of a homogeneous rhodium catalyst and hydroiodic acid to give acetic acid. This process is responsible for most of the industrial production of acetic acid.
An industrial scale use for pure carbon monoxide is purifying nickel in the Mond process.
Meat coloring
Carbon monoxide is used in modified atmosphere packaging systems in the US, mainly with fresh meat products such as beef, pork, and fish to keep them looking fresh. The carbon monoxide combines with myoglobin to form carboxymyoglobin, a bright-cherry-red pigment. Carboxymyoglobin is more stable than the oxygenated form of myoglobin, oxymyoglobin, which can become oxidized to the brown pigment metmyoglobin. This stable red color can persist much longer than in normally packaged meat. Typical levels of carbon monoxide used in the facilities that use this process are between 0.4% to 0.5%.
The technology was first given "generally recognized as safe" (GRAS) status by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in 2002 for use as a secondary packaging system, and does not require labeling. In 2004 the FDA approved CO as primary packaging method, declaring that CO does not mask spoilage odor. Despite this ruling, the process remains controversial for fears that it masks spoilage. In 2007 a bill[59] was introduced to the United States House of Representatives to label modified atmosphere carbon monoxide packaging as a color additive, but the bill died in subcommittee. The process is banned in many other countries, including Canada, Japan, Singapore, and the European Union.
Medicine
In biology, carbon monoxide is naturally produced by the action of heme oxygenase 1 and 2 on the heme from hemoglobin breakdown. This process produces a certain amount of carboxyhemoglobin in normal persons, even if they do not breathe any carbon monoxide.
Following the first report that carbon monoxide is a normal neurotransmitter in 1993, as well as one of three gases that naturally modulate inflammatory responses in the body (the other two being nitric oxide and hydrogen sulfide), carbon monoxide has received a great deal of clinical attention as a biological regulator. In many tissues, all three gases are known to act as anti-inflammatories, vasodilators, and encouragers of neovascular growth. However, the issues are complex, as neovascular growth is not always beneficial, since it plays a role in tumor growth, and also the damage from wet macular degeneration, a disease for which smoking (a major source of carbon monoxide in the blood, several times more than natural production) increases the risk from 4 to 6 times.
There is a theory that, in some nerve cell synapses, when long-term memories are being laid down, the receiving cell makes carbon monoxide, which back-transmits to the transmitting cell, telling it to transmit more readily in future. Some such nerve cells have been shown to contain guanylate cyclase, an enzyme that is activated by carbon monoxide.
Studies involving carbon monoxide have been conducted in many laboratories throughout the world for its anti-inflammatory and cytoprotective properties. These properties have potential to be used to prevent the development of a series of pathological conditions including ischemia reperfusion injury, transplant rejection, atherosclerosis, severe sepsis, severe malaria, or autoimmunity. Clinical tests involving humans have been performed, however the results have not yet been released.
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