How Can You Tell Whether Alcohol Is Oxidized or Not? Is There Any Reagent for It?
Question by livenletdie: How can you tell whether alcohol is oxidized or not? Is there any reagent for it?
Ok, I am working on my assignment, and I am quite stuck now. I am actually “working”, not trying to copy everything from this and other sites..
I have to design a lab to identify the tertiary alcohol, using “commonly available materials” . I know chromic acid and Lucas reagent are used for identifying type of alcohols, but in this case I have to use COMMONLY AVAILABLE materials… so I don’t think those two reagents are suitable for this lab.
I decided to use “commonly available” oxidizing agents, as tertiary alcohols do not easily oxidize.
However, even if I do, how can I tell whether it is oxidized or not? Is there any reagent that tells whether an alcohol is left or oxidized? Or do I have to use boiling points/ freezing points to find out? Maybe boiling point method is good; tertiary alcohol will have only one boiling point, while primary and secondary alcohols have more than one.
If there is any better way of identifying tertiary alcohol, could you please recommend?
Thanks!
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