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The Structure of Melamine

A form of plastic commonly used to make dinnerware, melamine has also entered the news in recent years as an adulterant of pet food products and baby formula in China. A melamine molecule contains a large percentage of nitrogen, and simple tests sometimes mistake it for protein due to its nitrogen content.

  1. Formula & IUPAC Naming

    • The chemical formula for melamine is C3H6N6, indicating that the molecule consists of three carbon atoms, six hydrogen atoms and six nitrogen atoms. Under the IUPAC (International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry) naming conventions, the melamine molecule bears the name 1,3,5-triazine-2,4,6-triamine, according to the National Institute of Standards and Technology. A person skilled in chemistry can use this name to understand what the molecule looks like.

    Chemical Structure

    • Melamine has a ring structure with six atoms making up the ring, and resonance between atoms. The ring, as commonly depicted, displays alternating double and single bonds, but in reality the atoms in the ring all equally share the bonding electrons; another type of visualization shows 1 1/2 bonds between each pair of atoms in the ring. The common depiction simply allows for an easier mathematical understanding of the molecule.

      Three carbon atoms alternate with three nitrogen atoms in this ring. In addition, each carbon atom connects to an amine group, NH2: a nitrogen atom connected to two hydrogen atoms.

    Significance

    • Melamine has a high nitrogen content: Most of its molecular weight consists of nitrogen. Some simple tests for protein content only show the amount of nitrogen in a food product. Therefore, some food manufacturers in China performed illicit "doping" of food products with melamine to allow dilution. The world market noticed this when some animals became ill, and some died, from eating pet food with contaminated gluten ingredients in 2007, according to Dobson et al., in Toxicological Sciences.

      In 2008, according to the World Health Organization, some young children in China became ill, which spurred officials to trace this contamination to milk and infant formula as well.

    Effects

    • Because the contaminators used waste melamine to adulterate the feed material, the melamine contained some cyanuric acid, a chemical compound very similar to melamine. The World Health Organization reports that the combination of cyanuric acid and melamine forms crystals in the urinary tract, leading to kidney damage.

      Either cyanuric acid or melamine can form crystals alone, according to Dobson et al., but it occurs at far lower concentrations with a combination of the two. This led to the toxicity reports.

    Uses

    • Manufacturers normally use melamine for making high-quality plastic dinnerware and other consumer goods. Dishes consisting of melamine do no harm; in fact, in its normal state, melamine exhibits low toxicity.

      The World Health Organization suggests that melamine migrating from dishware into the human diet occurs at extremely low levels and does not pose a concern.

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