9th Annual WML Academic Symposium

Presenter(s): Alexis Janoczkin
Title: Developing a Pedagogical Experiment on Solvent-Free Oxidation of Secondary Alcohols to Ketones
Developed under the guidance of Dr. Sarah Goforth , College of Arts & Sciences

Oxidations are fundamental synthetic reactions learned in undergraduate organic chemistry courses. A previously reported laboratory experiment involved oxidizing readily available secondary alcohol substrates into ketone products, and we have further developed the experiment particularly with regards to refining the analytical methods to best illustrate oxidation success to students. Several substrates were subjected to reflux oxidations with variation of experimental conditions and analytical methods. The best combination for a pedagogical experiment was found to be benzhydrol substrate oxidized by KMnO4/CuSO4•5H2O with a 30 min reflux. This combination yielded the most pure product and the most straightforward reaction and analysis procedures.