Sn2 Synthesis Lab Report

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In a two-day experiment, an SN2 reaction was conducted and benzyl bromide, sodium hydroxide, and an unknown were used. In a nucleophilic substitution reaction, the nucleophile and the alkyl carbon determine if the reaction is an SN2 or SN1 reaction. In an SN2 reaction, the process occurs in one step and works best with a primary carbon along with a strong nucleophile. During the experiment, recrystallization was used to purified the product; meanwhile, the melting point range and thin layer chromatography (TLC) data were used to identify the product of the reaction. After the completion, the unknown chemical was determined as 4-chlorobenzyl phenyl ether. To give an overview of the overall process, recrystallization is used to make a pure product, …show more content…

The melting point ranges supported that the purified product could either be sample D (4-chlorobenzyl phenyl ether) or sample E (4-Tert-butylbenzyl phenyl ether) because both share a similar melting point range. However, the tiny layer chromatography data supported only sample D (4-chlorobenzyl phenyl ether). Although the experiment was conducted to avoid mistakes, the yield does not really make sense because it is higher than 100%. The yield could be high because the sodium hydroxide (NaOH) did not completely dissolve or because the product did not fully dry. A way to test these proposed hypotheses is to repeat the experiment and reflux or dry for a longer time. Nevertheless, the recovery of the product does make sense because it is lower than 100% which means impurities were removed. The lost amount of product was about a third of the original mass. The increase melting point range of 52-60 to 59-64 for the product shows that impurities were removed because a pure product has a higher melting point range. The melting point of the product is slightly higher but still, falls around the melting point ranges of two possibilities. Therefore, using solely the melting point is not enough and therefore it is cannot be the only source to rely on. Another source of support to rely on is the thin layer chromatography to reinforce our hypothesis of the unknown. The data states that two compounds,

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