The only way of mastering any topic in Organic Chemistry is doing lots of practice problems. And I know, seeing my students, that starting to work on a practice problem may be the hardest part as you don’t know where to start. It is difficult to visualize what where the double bond would be moved if you follow the five curved arrows crammed in one step. Here is the trick:
We are always told to think before doing something. Fair enough. But let me tell you, it is also strangely enough, that in Organic Chemistry, it is often better to draw and then think about what you did (not in the lab though). It is much easier to have a structure in front of you and check for errors and improvements.
Do the first step, take the pencil and you will see that the ball gets rolling.
You have all these Organic Chemistry Practice Problems waiting to be solved!
The ketone functional group is another common and reactive carbonyl-containing group in organic chemistry. Like aldehydes, ketones play a central role in nucleophilic addition reactions, oxidation-reduction processes, and are widely found in both biological molecules and industrial compounds. Since ketones … Read more
The aldehyde functional group is one of the most common and reactive carbonyl-containing groups in organic chemistry. It plays a central role in oxidation-reduction reactions, nucleophilic additions, and many biological pathways. It is a carbonyl-containing group, so for starters, recall … Read more
We have seen countless examples of stereoisomers, such as enantiomers and diastereomers, which arise due to different absolute configurations of chiral centers. We learned that chiral centers are only possible when the carbon is connected to four different groups, which … Read more
Let’s look at this conversion through the eyes of a student new to organic chemistry: amides are almost like amines, except they contain a carbonyl (C=O) group attached to the nitrogen.So, how can we add a carbonyl to the nitrogen? … Read more
Two main fragmentation patterns are seen most frequently in the mass spectrometry of alcohols: α-Cleavage – breaking the bond next to the carbon bearing the hydroxyl group. Loss of water (M-18) – dehydration of the molecular ion. The reason for … Read more
The m/z 43 peak is one of the most common and characteristic fragments you’ll see in organic mass spectrometry.There are two main sources for this peak: 1) Acylium cation and 2) Propyl or isopropyl cation. While the propyl … Read more
Let’s discuss today how we identify an unknown compound from the combined data of IR, NMR, and Mass Spectrometry.A typical question you will see would be formulated as:Identify the molecule that gives the following IR and Mass spectra data. Let’s … Read more
When analyzing mass spectra, one of the first tools you can use to figure out the molecular formula of an unknown compound or answer other questions is the Nitrogen Rule. This rule helps you quickly determine whether a molecule contains … Read more
Isotopes are atoms of the same element that have the same number of protons but different numbers of neutrons, giving them different atomic masses. The keyword here is “mass,” because we are discussing mass spectrometry. In a practical sense, how … Read more
α-Cleavage is a common fragmentation in mass spectrometry that occurs in molecules containing a heteroatom, such as oxygen or nitrogen. In this process, the bond between the α-carbon (the carbon directly attached to the heteroatom) and the β-carbon breaks, producing … Read more
