Binary ethylenimine is a dimeric form of aziridine

Aziridine

Aziridines are organic compounds containing the aziridine functional group, a three-membered heterocycle with one amine group and two methylene groups...

. It can be produced by heating bromoethylamine hydrobromide or 2-aminoethyl hydrogen sulfate in the presence of sodium hydroxide (Gabriel method). It contains at least one three-membered ring which is very reactive because of the ring strain.

It is used to inactivate the foot-and-mouth disease

Foot-and-mouth disease

Foot-and-mouth disease or hoof-and-mouth disease is an infectious and sometimes fatal viral disease that affects cloven-hoofed animals, including domestic and wild bovids...

 virus in vaccine

Vaccine

A vaccine is a biological preparation that improves immunity to a particular disease. A vaccine typically contains an agent that resembles a disease-causing microorganism, and is often made from weakened or killed forms of the microbe or its toxins...

s for cattle

Cattle

Cattle are the most common type of large domesticated ungulates. They are a prominent modern member of the subfamily Bovinae, are the most widespread species of the genus Bos, and are most commonly classified collectively as Bos primigenius...

, as well as other viruses and mycoplasma

Mycoplasma

Mycoplasma refers to a genus of bacteria that lack a cell wall. Without a cell wall, they are unaffected by many common antibiotics such as penicillin or other beta-lactam antibiotics that target cell wall synthesis. They can be parasitic or saprotrophic. Several species are pathogenic in humans,...

 in blood

Blood

Blood is a specialized bodily fluid in animals that delivers necessary substances such as nutrients and oxygen to the cells and transports metabolic waste products away from those same cells....

 samples.

Contrary to early assumptions that ethylenimines only modified nucleic acid

Nucleic acid

Nucleic acids are biological molecules essential for life, and include DNA and RNA . Together with proteins, nucleic acids make up the most important macromolecules; each is found in abundance in all living things, where they function in encoding, transmitting and expressing genetic information...

s, it was found that trimeric ethyleimine also alters proteins in virus preparations, especially at higher pH

PH

In chemistry, pH is a measure of the acidity or basicity of an aqueous solution. Pure water is said to be neutral, with a pH close to 7.0 at . Solutions with a pH less than 7 are said to be acidic and solutions with a pH greater than 7 are basic or alkaline...

 values. The modification of the proteins affected viral particle uptake into cells. This should be taken into consideration when using BEI and other ethyleneimines as well.

Safety

BEI is very hazardous since it attacks nucleic acids and proteins as described above. It can be neutralised by sodium thiosulfate

Sodium thiosulfate

Sodium thiosulfate , also spelled sodium thiosulphate, is a colorless crystalline compound that is more familiar as the pentahydrate, Na2S2O3•5H2O, an efflorescent, monoclinic crystalline substance also called sodium hyposulfite or “hypo.”...

; the thiosulfate is a nucleophile which opens the three-membered ring.

The presence of BEI can be tested for using silver nitrate

Silver nitrate

Silver nitrate is an inorganic compound with chemical formula . This compound is a versatile precursor to many other silver compounds, such as those used in photography. It is far less sensitive to light than the halides...

solution.