BRAINCAKEDistillation
Distillation separates a liquid from a mixture by boiling it and condensing the vapour. In organic synthesis it is used to remove a volatile product from a reaction mixture, or to separate liquids with different boiling points.
The mixture is heated in a round-bottomed flask containing anti-bumping granules, which give smooth boiling. A still head holds a thermometer with its bulb level with the side arm, so it reads the temperature of the vapour leaving the flask. The vapour passes into a Liebig condenser, cooled by water that enters at the bottom and leaves at the top so the jacket stays full of cold water. The condensed liquid, the distillate, drips into a collecting flask.
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More in Organic Synthesis
- Heating under Reflux
- Using a Separating Funnel
- Drying an Organic Liquid
- Redistillation and Purification
- Identifying Functional Groups
- Two-Stage Synthetic Routes
- Predicting Properties from Functional Groups
All 8 lessons in Organic Synthesis · All OCR AS-level Chemistry topics