Presentation Type
Poster Presentation
Mentor/Supervising Professor Name
Menzmer, Mitch
Abstract (Description of Research)
This experiment investigated the kinetics of 2-methylpentan-2-ol using UV-visible spectroscopy under strongly acidic conditions (96% sulfuric acid). The dehydration of the tert-amyl alcohol produced a carbocation intermediate whose absorbance at 300 nm was evaluated at various temperatures. An Arrhenius plot of ln(k) versus 1/T produced a linear relationship with a calculated activation energy of 90.0 kJ/mol. This value is consistent with literature expectations for tertiary carbocation formation and supports the acid-catalyzed dehydration mechanism predicted for this molecule.
Included in
Kinetic Analysis of 2-methylpentan-2-ol*
This experiment investigated the kinetics of 2-methylpentan-2-ol using UV-visible spectroscopy under strongly acidic conditions (96% sulfuric acid). The dehydration of the tert-amyl alcohol produced a carbocation intermediate whose absorbance at 300 nm was evaluated at various temperatures. An Arrhenius plot of ln(k) versus 1/T produced a linear relationship with a calculated activation energy of 90.0 kJ/mol. This value is consistent with literature expectations for tertiary carbocation formation and supports the acid-catalyzed dehydration mechanism predicted for this molecule.