Okay, here's a question...

[vr_trakowski]

Human blood uses iron to transport oxygen molecules.  Oxygen-carrying blood is red--it's oxidized, after a fashion...rusty.  Fine. 

Vulcan blood (I know, work with me here) uses copper to transport oxygen.  Oxygenated copper turns green (or greeny-blue).  So... 

Is unoxygenated Vulcan blood...red? 

Comments

[plkphoto.livejournal.com]

*whips out old Animal Physiology textbook*

Warning, this may be TMI... And I'm not quite up to paraphrasing biochem terms at the moment, so I'll go for direct quotes.

Three relevant sections from my 4th ed. of Eckert Animal Physiology:

"Respiratory pigments are complexes of proteins and metallic ions, and each one has a characteristic color. The color of a respiratory pigment changes with its O2 content. Thus, hemoglobin, which is bright red when it is loaded with O2, becomes a dark maroon-red when deoxygenated."

"If O2 is bound, the molecule is referred to as oxyhemoglobin; if O2 is absent, it is called deoxyhemoglobin. Binding of O2 to hemoglobin to form oxyhemoglobin does not oxidize ferrous to ferric iron. Oxidation of the ferrous iron in hemoglobin to the ferric state produces methemoglobin, which does not bind O2 and therefore is nonfunctional."


About the oxygen transport molecule hemocyanin which is found in Mollusca (clams, snails, and octopus) and Arthropoda (spiders, insects, and centipedes):

"Hemocyanin, a large, copper-containing respiratory pigment, has many properties similar to those of hemoglobin... In its oxygenated form, it is light blue; in its unoxygenated form, it is colorless."

Yeah... er probably TMI, but I found it interesting... :-D
Let me know if you need a translation, and I'll try to help out.

PLK (http://community.livejournal.com/geekfiction/tag/plkphoto)