Questions tagged [physical-organic-chemistry]
For questions about how organic molecules and reactions are investigated using physical experiments.
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Difference between intermediates and transition states
Can someone please explain what exactly the difference between an intermediate and a transition state is?
I understand that they are formed as part of the process in converting the reactants to ...
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Aspirin Hydrolysis at pH 2
Conducting an experiment, I found that very little salicylic acid was evolved performing hydrolysis at $\mathrm{pH \ 2}$ and at $\pu{45 ^\circ C}$. In fact, far more salicylic acid was evolved at $\...
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What can we say about the dipole moment of terephthalic acid?
The dipole moment of quinol is not zero because it can exist in two different energetically favourable conformations. The weighted average is calculated to arrive a dipole moment of 1.6 D.
According ...
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Why do weak acids like ethanol not act as a strong base in water?
In water, ethanol has a $\mathrm{p}K_\mathrm{a} = 15.9$ which means that its $\mathrm{p}K_\mathrm{b}$ is $-1.9$. Which implies that all weak acids in water are in fact strong bases. But this is not ...
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Boiling and melting points of hydrocarbons [closed]
What happens while boiling and melting hydrocarbons? Which bonds are broken?
When we compare the boiling point (b.p.) and melting point (m.p.) of certain hydrocarbons the order is inverted. For ...
