The Student Room Group
Uni students - Complete our survey >>
Uni students - Complete our survey >>
Uni students - Complete our survey >>

Making aspirin from salicylic acid

Can aspirin still be made by reacting salicylic acid with ethanoic acid in esterification? Does the OH on salicylic act as an alcohol or not as I found out that salicylic acid normally reacts with ethanoic anhydride to form aspirin...

Thanks
Drugs are haram.
The OH attached to benzene ring is actually a phenol group which behaves differently. Not totally sure about your specific question honestly.
Reply 3
Avatar for coconut64
coconut64
OP
16
Original post by black1blade
The OH attached to benzene ring is actually a phenol group which behaves differently. Not totally sure about your specific question honestly.


Sorry about that. The question asks you to suggest a reaction to make aspirin from salicyclic acid. The answer would be reacting salicylic acid with ethanoic anhydride but I thought salicylic acid can behave like an alcohol. So phenol never behaves like an alcohol ? Thanks
Original post by coconut64
Sorry about that. The question asks you to suggest a reaction to make aspirin from salicyclic acid. The answer would be reacting salicylic acid with ethanoic anhydride but I thought salicylic acid can behave like an alcohol. So phenol never behaves like an alcohol ? Thanks


I don't think so at least I can't think of any cases in which it would. I'm pretty sure we do a lot more on the chemistry of benzene rings in a2 chemistry which will hopefully explain the difference in properties. But yeah I know for sure that phenol is much more acidic than alcohol group (phenol can make salts with alkalis but not not carbonates) and phenols can't be oxidized under reflux by potassium dichromate.

Quick Reply

Related discussions

Latest

Trending

Trending

Articles for you