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The Synthesis Of An Alkene 4-Methylcyclohexanol

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The goal of this experiment was to synthesize an alkene (4-methylcyclohexene) from an alcohol (4-methylcyclohexanol) by dehydration. The reaction, consist of 4-methylcyclohexanol, phosphoric acid, and sulfuric acid, was refluxed at a given time frame. The product was isolated by distillation and purified by adding sodium chloride to help the extraction. The final product had a 125% yield and was characterized by the IR spectroscopy and chemical reaction. The alkene resulted in a colorless liquid after adding molecular bromine dissolved in dichloromethane.

Introduction One of the most important things organic chemists do is synthesize new and complex structures from simpler structures by chemical reactions. The techniques done in …show more content…

By heating to refluxing, the temperature and thermal energy were controlled during the experiment. Heating the reaction is important because it is required in order for the bonds to break to cause a chemical reaction. Breaking bonds also means requiring energy and that is where activation energy comes into play. All chemical reactions has to overcome an energy barrier to generate the product from the reactant. The chemical yield is a measurement of how efficient the organic reactant was synthesized into the desired product. The chemical yield will be lower if there are unreacted reactants or too many side products in the reaction. Unless the product was isolated properly during the distillation, it will negatively affect the chemical yield too. The chemical yield is measured by dividing the number of moles of product to the number of moles of reactant then multiplying it by 100 to get the percentage. The final product formed was characterized by using an infrared spectroscopy and chemical reaction. The IR spectrum was expected to show a carbon double bond (alkene) and many C-H sp³ hybridization bonds (alkyl) from the final product. This was compared to the authentic sample with its vibrational bonds. Once done identifying how close the sample is with the authentic sample, that would be the evidence to support the product’s

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