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Organic synthesis

Organic synthesis

The functional groups define the physical and chemical properties of organic compounds. These can undergo chemical reactions, thus generating new compounds.
Many methods are already described in the literature to perform these chemical transformations and are commonly used in organic synthesis to achieve the synthesis of a target molecule (Named reactions and synthesis ).
Following the "birth" of this target molecule in a reaction mixture, we must subsequently separate it from the other constituents. Indeed, the organic chemist usually wants to work with pure substances to study its properties. He usually has a variety of techniques to separate a component from a crude mixture. Among the most important methods are:
  • Filtration
  • Decantation
  • Solid-liquid extraction
  • Distillation
    • Simple distillation
    • Fractional distillation
    • Rotary evaporator (rotavap)
    • Steam distillation
  • Liquid-liquid extraction
  • Drying
  • Recrystallization
  • Column chromatography
The chemist who wants to synthesize an already known organic molecule can use databases to compare analyzes of this one with the already listed analyzes.
But if we conceive of a new organic molecule (nonexistent in the literature), we must show that the structure of this one is the expected one. Here are the main characterization tools that confirm the nature of the new synthesized product:
  • Nuclear Magnetic Resonance spectroscopy (NMR)
  • Mass Spectrometry (MS)
  • InfraRed Spectroscopy (IR)
  • Single-Crystal X-Ray Diffraction (SC-XRD)
Sometimes other types of analysis may be needed to characterize the new material, for example:
  • Raman spectroscopy (Raman)
  • UltraViolet-VISible Spectroscopy (UV-Vis)
  • High Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC)
Finally, to publish the structure of the new product, one must write a scientific article following pre-established standards.