Dichloromethane Lab Report

Caroline Guidry
Dr. Beverly A. Clement
Organic Chemistry 2423, Section 304
25 October 2017
Lab 6: Natural Products I The main goal of this experiment was to employ isolation techniques to derive chemicals from two different natural sources and study their properties (Clement 91).
The two natural sources used in this experiment were an orange (the peel contains limonene, which is a terpene) and a dichloromethane solution of clove oil (which contains eugenol, an acetogenin).
To isolate the eugenol, 20 mL of dichloromethane solution of clove oil was extracted twice; each time with a 15 mL portion of 3M NaOH. The aqueous extracts were then combined and acidified with approximately 17.6 mL of 6M aqueous HCl. Eugenol was isolated from the aqueous mixture by two extractions of 10 mL portions of dichloromethane. The dichloromethane extracts were then combined and dried by adding 1.9066 grams of anhydrous calcium chloride to the
Water was added to the flask to yield a total volume of approximately 51.2 mL. A steam distillation was performed, and about 28 mL of distillate was collected in the receiving flask. The distillate was added to a separatory funnel to perform an extraction with 5 mL of ethyl acetate. The ethyl acetate extract was then dried by adding 0.6102 grams of anhydrous calcium chloride to remove the water. The contents were filtered to remove the anhydrous calcium chloride from the ethyl acetate extract. This liquid contained the extracted limonene, and it was placed on a hot plate to boil off the solvent (leaving pure limonene extract behind). The amount of isolated pure limonene was determined to be approximately 1.6 grams. The percentage of limonene found in the orange peel was calculated as follows:
% Limonene = [grams of recovered limonene] ÷ [grams of initial oil peel] X 100 = [1.6 g] ÷ [10.2693 g] X