Organic Chemistry Lab

Module 1 (5 cfu)
1. Safety and accident prevention in the chemical laboratory
2. Main techniques for the isolation and purification of organic compounds (extraction, crystallisation, simple and fractional distillation, chromatography)
3. Introduction to IR spectroscopy
4. Experimental aspects of some fundamental organic reactions (oxidations, reductions, condensations, nucleophilic substitutions, Fischer synthesis), evaluation of the purity grade of the obtained products through TLC and melting point measurement
5. The experimental activities performed in the laboratory aim at applying the topics discussed in classroom.

Module 2 (5 cfu)
Selected examples of chemical transformations and functional groups conversions are presented, including reactions related to electrophilic aromatic substitution. Introduction to NMR spectroscopy. The experimental activities developed in the organic chemistry laboratory are aimed at applying the topics discussed in classroom:
the synthesis of an amide of an aromatic carboxylic acid, an example of aromatic heterocycle synthesis, a two steps reaction sequence for the preparation of a substituted aniline, the use of diazonium salt in the preparation of an indicator, a phase transfer-catalyzed transformation.
Finally the determination of an unknown carbonyl compound, the separation of a mixture of two unknown compounds, their recognition and preparation of their suitable derivatives are the topics of the last week in lab.
The characterization of the products will be accomplished by melting point, TLC analysis, IR and NMR spectroscopy.
The common purification techniques for organic compounds are employed: crystallization, acid/base separation, distillation under vacuum, chromatographic separation on a silica gel column.