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Experiment : Melting Point And Percent Yield Of Dimethyl Fumarate

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A. Melting Point and percent yield of Dimethyl Fumarate Dimethyl Fumarate was not successfully created during the course of this particular experiment, likely because of a failure of the bromine to mix with the other components of the test tubes. It was observed that the bromine had formed a separate fraction at the top of the rest of the test tube contents, and because of this the necessary reaction could not occur in substantial amounts for a precipitate of dimethyl fumarate to form. The amount of bromine that was in contact with the dichloromethane and dimethyl maleate was simply too small for a significant reaction to occur. The data discussed below is sourced from Alexander Boley. Alex reported the melting point range to be 94-97°C, with an accepted range of 102-105°C. The lower boiling point is most likely due to the compound not being dried sufficiently before the melting point was tested. Alex also reported isolating 0.348 grams of dimethyl fumarate. Since he utilized 0.5 g of dimethyl maleate solution, and the accepted density of dimethyl maleate is 1.153 g/ml, the theoretical maximum amount of dimethyl fumarate that could have been obtained is 0.5765 g; dimethyl fumarate would be present in the same amounts as it's steroisomer because of their identical constitution, so dimethyl maleate's density is a valid input for calculating the final amount of product. The result indicates that his percent yield was 60.36%. The percent loss indicated could be attributed to

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