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!
In the previous few posts, we went over the basics of electrophilic aromatic substitution-halogenation, nitration, and sulfonation. Now, let’s dive into one of the most important EAS reactions discovered in 1877 by Charles Friedel and James Crafts, which allows for … Read more
In the previous post, we talked about Friedel-Crafts alkylation – a classic reaction for attaching alkyl groups to benzene rings. A similar reaction is used for adding an acyl group to the aromatic ring, thus making a ketone. This is … Read more
The Beckmann rearrangement is a reaction in which a ketone is first converted to an oxime, which, under acidic or Lewis acidic conditions, rearranges into an amide. This reaction is closely related to the Hofmann, Schmidt, and Curtius rearrangements, as … Read more
Baeyer-Villiger Oxidation The Baeyer-Villiger oxidation is a rearrangement reaction that converts ketones to esters using peroxycarboxylic acids, such as meta-chloroperoxybenzoic acid (mCPBA). The Baeyer–Villiger oxidation can also convert aldehydes into carboxylic acids, but let’s be honest, including that as a key use … Read more
Let’s determine the relationship between the molecules in each of the following two pairs of molecules: They have the same chemical formula and connectivity of atoms, which, however, have different spatial arrangements. Therefore, they are stereoisomers: … Read more
To understand what configurational isomers are, let’s define/describe the terms “configuration” and “conformation”. Configuration is the orientation/direction of the atoms that we cannot change, whereas conformation is the orientation of the atoms which we can change via rotation about a … Read more
Enantiomers and diastereomers are types of stereoisomers. Recall that stereoisomers are isomers with the same connectivity but different spatial arrangement of atoms. The isomers with different connectivity of atoms are called constitutional isomers: The (R)-2-chlorobutane and (S)-2-chlorobutane shown … Read more
In the previous post, we learned about ortho/para and meta-directing effects of various groups and atoms. Except for halogens, ortho/para directors are those who activate the benzene ring in electrophilic aromatic substitution, whereas deactivators direct the substitution in the meta position. Here … Read more
You might have heard the term “Nonsuperimposable Mirror Images” during the lecture but did not quite understand what it was and how it was related to enantiomers, diastereomers, or other types of correlations between organic molecules. So, what does … Read more
We have seen that carboxylic acids can be reduced with LiAlH4 and boranes to primary alcohols. We also know that esters, nitriles, and acid chlorides can be reduced to aldehydes using DIBAL or at lowered temperatures (typically -78 oC): … Read more
