Melamine cyanurate

Melamine cyanurate, also known as melamine-cyanuric acid adduct or melamine-cyanuric acid complex, is a crystalline complex formed from a 1:1 mixture of melamine and cyanuric acid. The substance is not a salt despite its non-systematic name melamine cyanurate. The complex is held together by an extensive two-dimensional network of hydrogen bonds between the two compounds, reminiscent to that seen in DNA base pairing. Melamine cyanurate forms spoke-like crystals from aqueous solutions and has been implicated as a causative agent for toxicity seen in the Chinese protein export contamination and the 2007 pet food recall.