Biological Role and Toxicity
Copper, although potentially toxic in excessive amounts, is essential for life. Copper is shown to have antimicrobial properties which make it useful for hospital doorknobs to keep diseases from being spread. Eating food in copper containers is known to increase the risk of copper toxicity.
Elemental gold and silver have no known toxic effects or biological use, although gold salts can be toxic to liver and kidney tissue. Like copper, silver also has antimicrobial properties. The prolonged use of preparations containing gold or silver can also lead to the accumulation of these metals in body tissue; the results are the irreversible but apparently harmless pigmentation conditions known as chrysiasis and argyria respectively.
Due to being short lived and radioactive, roentgenium has no biological use but it is expected to be extremely harmful due to its radioactivity.
Read more about this topic: Group 11 Element
Famous quotes containing the words biological and/or role:
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