Elite Engineer Posted September 30, 2015 Share Posted September 30, 2015 Is dichloromethane the end all be all best organic solvent for LLE? I I only have hexane available, but I'm not sure if I'm wasting my time. Is DCM much better than hexane? (additional info: I'm extracting eugenol from water, after I steam distilled cloves) ~EE Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Cuthber Posted September 30, 2015 Share Posted September 30, 2015 If you are extracting eugenol from water both solvents will work. One point to remember, eugenol is slightly denser than water and hexane is less dense. If you are unlucky, you will end up with a mixture that's the same density as water and it won't settle out. You can avoid that, and improve the extraction efficiency, by saturating the liquid with salt. Also, hexane has a huger boiling point, so it's more difficult to remove. You can improve the purity somewhat if you make use of the fact that eugenol will dissolve in dilute alkali. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elite Engineer Posted September 30, 2015 Author Share Posted September 30, 2015 will the salt prevent the eugenol from sinking to the bottom? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Cuthber Posted October 1, 2015 Share Posted October 1, 2015 If there's more than about 10% w/v salt in the water, yes. It will also lower the solubility of the eugenol in water 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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