CHE 211 Organic Chemistry I
Exp01 Chemical Literature & Laboratory Notebooks
Fall 2006 Last Revised 9/5/2006 Page 1 of 3
Relevant Chapters in Zubrick: 2, 3
Introduction
When preparing for work in the laboratory it is essential to know as much as possible about the chemicals and
techniques that you will be using. This is important not only for safety’s sake but also so you can troubleshoot an
experiment while you are performing it. The sources for information are varied and it can be quite intimidating
decided what sources you should use and what information is the most important.
What’s Important and What’s Not?
Usually you perform some sort of chem ical transformation in the laboratory. This is usually given as some sort of
chemical reaction similar to that shown below.
CH
3
COOH
CH
3
COOCH
3
OBr
2
O
Br
HBr
+ +
There are several important features that can help you determine what you need to look up. The major organic
compounds (the compounds with a five-membered ring) are the compounds you’ll want to know the most about.
When looking at the reaction arrow, you will usually find any reagents (CH
3
COOH) above the arrow and any
solvents (CH
3
COOCH
3
) below the arrow. Other minor reagents are shown to the left (Br
2
) of the arrow. Minor
products are shown to the right (HBr) of the arrow. The major organic compounds are the ones you should know
the most about. The other reagents, products, and solvents are important, but prim arily for caution’s sake.
What to Look For and Where to Find It?
There are many details that you should find for all of the compounds listed in a reaction. These include the…
• molecular name, formula, and mass
• density
• melting point and/or boiling point (mp for solids, mp and bp for liquids, and bp for gases)
• any important safety information (flamm ability, volatility, toxicity, etc.)
For the major organic compounds, you should look up some additional information related it’s the identification of
the compounds.
• index of refraction (for liquids)
• mass (MS) spectra
• ultraviolet/visible (UV/Vis) spectra
• infrared (IR) spectra
• nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectra (
1
H or
13
C)
Finding the molecular names, formulas, and masses is a simple matter and there is no need to look anything up.
Other information such as the density, m p, bp, safety information, and index of refraction can be found in one or
more of the common informational books that are available (the Merck Manual, Lange’s Handbook, CRC
Handbook, or the Aldrich Catalog). These days, there are even a couple of online databases that have much of
this information such as eMolecules (http://www.emolecules.com), the NIST WebBook (http://webbook.nist.gov/),
or even ChemFinder (http://www.chemfinder.com/).
Spectra are a bit more difficult to come by. There are several spectral collections available but we don’t have
them here at Front Range. Thankfully, there are two excellent sources for spectra online: the NIST WebBook and
the Spectral Data Base System (http://www.aist.go.jp/RIODB/SDBS/menu-e.html).
