www.ccsenet.org/mas Modern Applied Science Vol. 5, No. 2; April 2011 Published by Canadian Center of Science and Education 71 Study of the Interaction of Trimethyltin(IV) Chloride with N,N,N’,N’-tetraethylethylenedimanine in Reference to Marine Environmental Pollution E.M.Shoukry (Corresponding author) Department of Chemistry, Faculty of Science, Al-Azhar University (Egypt) & Taif University (Kingdom of Saudi Arabia) Tel: 2-010-183-4458 fax: 2-35728843 E-mail: Eman_shoukry2002@hotmail.com M. F. Amin Department of Chemistry, Faculty of Science, Al-Azhar University, Egypt Received: December 15, 2010 Accepted: February 13, 2011 doi:10.5539/mas.v5n2p71 Abstract The interaction of trimethyltin(IV) with N,N,N’,N’-tetraethylethylenediamine (Et 4 en) was investigated potentiometrically. The hydrolysis constants of trimethyltin(IV) species and formation constants of the amine complexes are determined. The formation constant of the complex is high, which may suggest to use Et 4 en as an antidote for triorganotin(IV) poisoning, the main source of marine environmental pollution. The effect of solvent dielectric constant of the medium and temperature on the complex formation equilibria was investigated. Keywords: Complex formation equilibria, trimethyltin(IV), Stability constant, Antidote, Speciation 1. Introduction In the last two decades coordination compounds of organotin(IV) exhibit interesting antitumoural activity against several human cancer cell lives(Zhu et.al, 2004) and some of them are are extremely toxic to animals and humans (Cardiano et. al, 2008, Nolan et. al, 2005). The deleterious effect of trialkyltin(IV) derivatives is due to the inhibition of mitochondrial oxidative phosphorylation (Aldridge, 1976) and the ability to bind certain proteins (Elliott et. al, 1979).The toxicity of tetra-alkyltins also appears to be due trialkyltin(IV) species which are produced as a result of dealkylation in vivo. For these reasons, significant attention is paid to environmental pollution by alkyltin compounds and to their presence in food. Consequently there is a need to study their complex formation equilibria with a hope to find an antitode for it. With this in mind and in conjunction with our previous studies (Shoukry, 2002; Shoukry et.al, 1995; Shoukry et.al. 2000; Shoukry et.al. 1995; Shoukry et.al 1986), on metal complexes of biological significance, the present paper includes the results of the study of trimethyltin(IV) complexes with N,N,N’,N’-tetraethylethylenediamine. The complex formation equilibria is investigated with the hope that such type of coordinating ligand might possess favorable properties, possibly as carries in body fluids. 2. Experimental details 2.1 Materials and reagents Trimethyltin(IV) chloride (TMA) were supplied by Merk Chem. Co. N,N,N’,N’-tetraethylethylenediamine (Et 4 en) was provided by Sigma Chem. Co. Sodium hydroxide stock solutions were prepared by diluting the content of BDH concentrated volumetric solution vials. These solutions were systematically checked by titration against potassium hydrogen phthalate. The amine solutions were prepared in the diprotonated form by dissolution in two equivalents of nitric acid solution. 2.2 Equipments and Measuring Techniques Potentiometric titrations were performed with a Metrohm 686 titroprocessor. The titroprocessor and electrode were calibrated with standard buffer solutions( Bates, 1975), potassium hydrogen phthalate (pH 4.008) and a mixture of KH 2 PO 4 and Na 2 HPO 4 (pH 6.865) at 25ºC.