Hydrochloric Acid → 2-(4-Tert-butyl-2,6-dimethylphenyl)acetic acid

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Reaction Conditions

Reaction Steps

A mixture of 2.89 g of 4-tert-butyl-2,6-dimethylmandelic acid and 7.75 g of 4-tert-butyl-2,6-dimethylmandelic acid acetate, 4.5 g of 37% strength hydrochloric acid, 1.86 g of red phosphorus and 0.66 g of KI in 30 ml of glacial acetic acid is heated at 100° C. for 16 hours. Excess phosphorus is filtered off with suction and washed three times with in each case 10 ml of glacial acetic acid. The filtrate is substantially concentrated on a rotary evaporator at a bath temperature of 50° C./60 mbar. The resulting residue is diluted with 25 ml of water and, by addition of 10% strength aqueous sodium hydroxide solution, dissolved. This solution is extracted twice with in each case 20 ml of MTBE and then adjusted to pH 1 using 48% strength sulfuric acid. The resulting greasy solid is taken up in methylene chloride. This solution is extracted with 25 ml of water, dried over sodium sulfate and concentrated using a rotary evaporator. This gives 7.66 g of 4-tert-butyl-2,6-dimethylphenylacetic acid in a purity of 99.0 GC area % (yield about 86% of theory).

Provenance & Evidence