Magnesium cannot be found naturally in its metallic form which has a silvery white in colour, but can only be found as magnesium oxide or various salts. When magnesium is ignited, it produces a white flame which is difficult to put out especially if immersed in CO2. Magnesium-containing compounds are necessary for photosynthetic processes in order to convert carbon dioxide and water into glucose. Plants are green due to the green pigments called chlorophyll which contains a flat planar ring structure called porphyrin. Porphyrin can also be found in cytochromes, haemoglobin, and the oxygen storage myoglobin. Chlorophyll a, the most common form of chlorophyll, is contained within all photosynthetic organisms which absorbs light from violet-blue and orange-red wavelengths making them green. …show more content…
They are then passed from molecule to molecule until they reach an electron acceptor at the reaction centre where NADPH and ATP are produced, they are consumed by a light-dependant process that uses CO2 to form carbohydrates. Phillipe Barbier, a french chemist in the nineteenth century, discovered a way to produce a small amount of dimethyl heptanol by reacting methyl iodide, magnesium and methyl heptanone together under anhydrous conditions. Following his discovery, his student, Victor Grignard found out that by performing a reaction in different steps will produce a higher yield. The Grignard Reagent which can be reacted with a range of carbonyl-containing compounds to form an alcohol can be produced by reacting alkyl halide and magnesium using dry ether as a