Talk:Chlorine-releasing compounds

Heading

What is the chemical nature of this? Is it always a chloramine or is it a generic class of compounds. Online I cannot see much about it. If it is a fixed chemical, then we need more information about that, or merge to an article on that topic, with this as an alternate name. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 01:05, 15 January 2017 (UTC)

This is a family of compounds which includes chloramine. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 18:18, 16 January 2017 (UTC)

Name of the article

The article is not specifically about whitening or bleaching. The name "chlorine base compounds" is the one used by the World Health Organization. Not seeing the discussion to move. Bleach is typically sodium hypochlorite not all of these of course are. We have an article on bleach and this is not it. This article is about a grouping of ATC code D08AX compounds. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 10:47, 9 June 2018 (UTC)

• Sorry for the undiscussed move, but it seemed an obvious fix.
  Let me plead to return to the name "Chlorine based bleach" and the slightly wider focus.
  The name "chlorine base compounds" is used by just one organization right now, but the concept "chlorine based bleach" is highly relevant in a much wider arra of contexts, including housekeeping.
  The WTO is concerned only with public health uses of the compounds, but it does not seem reasonable to split the discussion of most of those compounds in two separate articles, just beause they have two usages and the WTO has a list of one specific subset of them. Disinfection in public health and medicine is an important and widely recognized purpose of chlorine based bleaches, even when sold under the name "bleach"; and that includes Cl2 and ClO2 (e.g. in water chlorination).
  The concept of "chlorine based bleach" deserves its own article, separate from bleach, because many of the topics (such as health hazards, environmental impact, chemistry and mechanism of action) are specific to chlorine-based bleaches, including Cl2 and ClO2; but do not apply to peroxde-based bleaches, or SO2-based bleaches.
  Furthermore, the name "chlorine base compounds" is misleading, because it appears to be about the general chemical class of compounds that have chlorine as the main element or primary feedstock; when in fact it is a WTO-specific nomenclature. A more accurate name could be "WTO chlorine base compounds" or something like that.
  . --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 01:03, 11 June 2018 (UTC)
  • PS. The name "Chlorine releasing compound" is better, but it still implies any chemical compound that releases chlorine; whereas the article, as it is now, is specifically about clorine-releasing chemicals marketed or used, domestically or industrially for the purpose of disinfection. So maybe change to "chlorine based disinfectants" or "chlorine releasing disinfectants"?
    But still I think that it is not sensible to have separate articles for the bleaching and disinfectant uses. And I think that Cl2 itself should be included, in the same spirit that 0 is now considered a number too.
    --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 01:32, 11 June 2018 (UTC)
    • The other compounds in this family do not appear to be refereed to as bleach. What reference are you using that says this family is refered to as "chlorine releasing bleach" more commonly? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 07:54, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

History

The header says that "chlorine base compounds first came into use as disinfectants in 1915.[4]". However, (as told in the History section) Sodium and calcium hypochlorites were used as disinfectants as early as 1820, thanks to Labarraque. --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 01:35, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

This textbook from 2000

Is better than the original 1828 paper[1]

It says "and chlorine releasing compounds in 1915 by Dakin"

Do you have a modern reference that says chlorine releasing compounds were used as disinfectants earlier?

Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 07:58, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

• The article from 1828 says that hypochlorites were being used as disinfectants then. In Labarraque biographies and other sources it is clear that his discovery was a big thing, and he personally was involved in spreading it to developing countries. That article and those other sources show that the 2000 textbook is wrong by almost 100 years... --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 22:00, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

• Do you have a modern reference that states this? We tend not to use primary sources directly per WP:RS Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 09:03, 14 June 2018 (UTC)

• Mystery solved. The reference to "1915 Dakin" is to the first use of sodium hypochlorite at 0.5% (Dakin's solution) as a topical treatment to treat wounds. The use if more concentrated solutions as disinfectants for ambients, utensils, etc. (but not wounds -- too caustic) is due to Labarraque starting 1820, as attested in innumerable sources like this one. --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 06:22, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

Okay so we are good with 1915 than? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 20:00, 18 June 2018 (UTC)

This EB article is about bleaching and does not mention chlorine-releasing compounds.[2]

Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 08:09, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

• Sodium and calcium hypochlorites are chlorine releasing compounds. Their bleaching and disinfectant actions are both due to the released chlorine. --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 22:00, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

Sure I have added a bit about bleaching. Does this apply to the whole family of compounds though or just bleach? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 18:44, 14 June 2018 (UTC)

Removed inappropriate infobox

Chlorine-releasing compounds

Clinical data
Drug class	Disinfectant
ATC code	D08AX (WHO)

I removed the "drug" infobox (preserved above this paragraph in the source code of this Talk page), since this is not a drug but a broad class of chemical porducts that are used as "drugs", specifically as external disinfectants. For that reason, most of the fields are either not applicable, or had their content commented out (presumably for being incorrect). --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 02:14, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

These are are group of medical products and thus I have restored. They are on the WHO essential list of medicines. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 07:54, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

The drug infobox makes sense for individual drugs. It is not meaningful or useful for a group of products that are useful for health (but also for other uses)defined by one particular document of one particular entity. It only messes up the article's source. Note that there is already an article specific for the latter, the ATC code D08 article. --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 22:07, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

We also use the boxes for families of medicines. We could switch to that one. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 18:51, 14 June 2018 (UTC)

Section on available chlorine

I moved the explanation of "free" or "available chlorine" from sodium hypochlorite to this article, since it seems to apply to all chlorine-releasing compounds used for disinfection or bleaching. However I left out the detailed computations below, since they seem to confuse more than help the reader:

The masses of NaClO and water will be constant before and after dilution. If w_b, ρ(w_b) are the mass fraction and density of NaClO in the undiluted solution, and V_b its volume, and w and ρ(w) and V are likewise for the final solution, the masses of NaClO (M_b) and water (M_w) before and after dilution are conserved:

$M_{b}=w_{b}\rho (w_{b})V_{b}=w\rho (w)V$

$M_{w}=(1-w_{b})\rho (w_{b})V_{b}+\rho _{w}V_{w}=(1-w)\rho (w)V$

where ρ_w and V_w are the density and volume of the added water. Solving the above equations for w and V, the final NaClO mass fraction will be:

$w={\frac {V_{b}w_{b}\rho (w_{b})}{V_{b}\rho (w_{b})+V_{w}\rho _{w}}}$

and the final NaClO mass concentration will be:

$c={\frac {M_{b}}{V}}=w\rho (w)$

Dividing this by 1.05 will yield the mass concentration of free chlorine.

Maybe this material can sill be salvaged. --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 06:35, 13 June 2018 (UTC)

Agree overly complicated and reasonable to leave out of this article. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 08:54, 14 June 2018 (UTC)

Mechanism of action

The mechanism of action is claimed to be due to released chlorine. That is what was claimed in various hypochlorite articles. However, the disinfecting and bleaching actions of hypochlorites, in particular, seem to be due more to the oxygen than to the chlorine. In the iodide oxidation reaction, for example, NaClO plus 2 protons plus 2 iodide anions becomes NaCl plus I
₂ plus water. That is the same oxidizing effect as one molecule of Cl
₂, even though the NaClO has only one atom of chlorine.
On the other hand, I suppose that chlorine is indeed the oxidizing agent for chloramine.
The "Mechanism of action" section should be expanded to account for this. --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 06:52, 13 June 2018 (UTC)

We do need to use references to support. The references should be about "chlorine releasing compounds" generally rather tan one specific compound. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 08:58, 14 June 2018 (UTC)

The mechanism of action for all hypochlorites should be the same. Ditto for chloramines, which (accoring to Dakin ~1915) act by releasing hypochlorite in contact with biological materials. --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 16:24, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

Do we have a reference that says that? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:58, 18 June 2018 (UTC)

I found a few and will work on that section tomorrow, hopefully. They claim that the active agent is specifically hypochlorous acid (not the hypochlorite ion, which seems to be inert) and that its main action is to inhibit the enzymes that mediate glucose/ATP chemistry. --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 02:19, 19 June 2018 (UTC)

In any case, it is oxidation. Chlorine in solution will be in some equilibrium between Cl
₂ and hypochlorite. The distinction is with chloride, which does not have the oxidizing property. I suppose Cl
₂ can still oxidize in a completely dry environment, but that is rare. Gah4 (talk) 19:30, 2 August 2020 (UTC)

Reference templates

These are fairly standard. Not sure why they were all removed form the lead so I have restored them?

Plus a bunch of stuff added was unreferenced. They are medicines but not pharmaceuticals per my understanding of the definitions of the terms.

What was this referenced used for [3] I am not seeing anything on page 52 about the topic in question? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 15:02, 19 June 2018 (UTC)

I explained the reasons why cite templates are bad in your talk page.
I submit to your authority for the distinction between "medicine" and "pharmaceutical" (although pharmaceutical links to medication).
What exactly was unreferenced in my version of the lead?
The reference to the book was added by someone else, maybe in some other related article that I have been edition, like bleach or sodium hypochlorite. The correct page number is 119, a table that lists sodium hypochlorite, chlorine, and sodium dichloroisocyanurate as chlorine-based textile bleaches (besides other bleaches based on peroxides, sulphur dioxide, or other compounds. (I think I can understand how the original editor got the wrong page number, given how Google Books's search works.)
--Jorge Stolfi (talk) 19:36, 19 June 2018 (UTC)

There are lots of reasons why cite templates are good also. Standard practice is to continue using the format already used in the article, which is with the templates.

Medication and medicine are slightly different in meaning.

This was unreferenced "Chlorine-releasing compounds are a family of pharmaceutical and chemical products that release chlorine in the form of hypochlorous acid."

Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 13:45, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

joke

There is in some other articles mentioned of chlorine-releasing compounds being compounds that release chlorine, as a sort-of joke. That is, when the definition is exactly what is being defined. Not that I disagree with it, but thought some here might want to know. Gah4 (talk) 19:32, 2 August 2020 (UTC)

Organic matter

The article states "The presence of organic matter can make them less effective as disinfectants". True in a sense and silly in another sense: the very targets of chlorine-releasing disinfectants are organisms, which are organic matter. --Smokefoot (talk) 17:00, 1 August 2021 (UTC)

Also, many of these compounds discussed in this article do not release Cl2 if used as intended. So I wonder if it is just WP:SYNTHESIS, i.e. a nice story based on common perceptions but technically incorrect. Bleach functions by the action of OCl-, I suspect. Chloramines do not release Cl2 either. So there are some potential inconsistencies built into this article. Want a real chlorine releasing compound? Try molybdenum hexachloride. Just look at that stuff cross-eyed, chlorine is evolved. PhICl2 is also a carrier of Cl2, I would guess. --Smokefoot (talk) 17:07, 1 August 2021 (UTC)