Aspirin Essay

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Synthesis and Characterization of Aspirin
Product Identity and Purity
After synthesizing a chemical, especially a drug, it is important to confirm the identity and purity of the product. You will perform three tests to examine the identity and purity of the aspirin that you synthesized. One test will detect the presence of leftover salicylic acid in the synthesized aspirin and allow you to determine its concentration. Government regulations stipulate that commercial aspirin must not contain residual salicylic acid since it is irritating to the mouth, throat, and stomach. Iron salts react with phenols to form a complex ion that has a purple color, therefore iron (III) chloride can be used to determine if your aspirin sample contains residual salicylic acid. The second test uses melting point to evaluate the purity of your aspirin product. You will measure the melting point of pure acetylsalicylic acid (135°C) as a comparison to your product. The melting point of a pure aspirin sample should be within 1°C of its known melting point. A compound that contains impurities will tend to melt over a range of temperatures and at temperatures lower than the fixed mp for the pure compound. For example naphthalene, an ingredient of mothballs, has a melting point of 80°C and a pure sample of naphthalene would most likely be observed to melt within 80-81°C. An impure sample of naphthalene might melt over a range from 75-80 °C. Impurities in the crystals of the compound weaken the structure, which results in the compound melting at a lower temperature. In addition, impurities will be unevenly distributed throughout a sample of a compound. This non-uniform composition results in some areas of the sample being more “pure” than othe...

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...in a 1:1 ratio to form a purple colored complex. In the phosphate lab you learned to use spectrophotometry to determine the concentration of an unknown. An iron solution and salicylic acid will be available, as well as pipettes and volumetric flasks. In the density lab you learned to develop your own procedure for an experiment. You should be able to use spectrophotometry to determine the amount of salicylic acid in your aspirin. You will need to create a calibration graph and use it to determine the quantity of salicylic acid in your sample. Report this as a percentage. Think about how you will accomplish this before you come to lab. You may have to try several variations. Feel free to discuss your ideas with your classmates on how to achieve this goal.

WASTE DISPOSAL

Reference: Operational Organic Chemistry, 3rd edition by John W. Lehman (1999)

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