Sciencemadness Discussion Board

What do to with these weird chemicals?

woelen - 9-7-2007 at 09:49

A friend of mine has to stop his chemistry and pyrotechnics hobby, unfortunately for not such pleasant personal reasons. He has given me a LOT of chemicals, most of them in the 10 to 100 grams range, a few a little bit more. I really am happy with what I received. I now have 50 grams of NH4ClO4, NaClO4, KClO4, many metals (Mn, Ti, Mg/Al, Mg, Al, Fe) all in powder form, or fine scales, also 50 grams, some even a little more.

I also received a lot of salts, and a lot of organics. However, with many of the organics I am totally stuck. I have not the faintest idea what I can do with them. Most of these chemicals are still in their original sealed containers :o. I will mention the ones, for which I really would like to know a good use in my home lab for experimenting:

4-chloroacetinilide, 50 grams
phenylmercury acetate, 50 grams
5-(4-dimethylaminobenzylidene) rhodanine, 10 grams
xylenolorange, tetrasodium salt, 1 gram
4-aminohippuric acid, 5 grams
tetrazolium blue, 10 grams
5,5-diphenylhydantoin, 100 grams
SPADNS, 1 gram
1-butaneboronic acid, 10 grams
o-tolidine, 50 grams
alpha-amylase, 1 gram
beta-amylase, 1 gram
capsaicin, 1 gram
vitamin E (alpha tocopherol), 50 ml
folic acid, 10 grams

A few of these are air- and light sensitive and for this reason they are in completely opaque black bottles.

I even have more organics from him, but these I know what to do with (many dyes, pH-indicators, redox indicators).

Any suggestions on how to put these chemicals to good use are welcomed here ;) .

bereal511 - 9-7-2007 at 10:03

Hmmm, I always wanted to have a bit of amylase around to see if I could make a continuous sake fermentation system, instead of working with the koji mold. The amylase would break down the rice fluid, which would then be drained to the main fermentation vat. Can't think of much else to do with amylase except turn starches into sugars for fermenting.

dedalus - 9-7-2007 at 10:35

4-chloroacetinilide, 50 grams
This could be a precursor for a methaquaalone analogue.

phenylmercury acetate, 50 grams
Sounds very nasty, organo mercurials often are

5-(4-dimethylaminobenzylidene) rhodanine, 10 grams
This is an indicator used in the titration of cyanide solutions with silver nitrate, also a colorimetric indicator for various precious metals.

xylenolorange, tetrasodium salt, 1 gram
I think this is a metal ion indicator, I've seen it used in the analysis of zinc plating baths.


4-aminohippuric acid, 5 grams
tetrazolium blue, 10 grams
5,5-diphenylhydantoin, 100 grams

Don't know.

SPADNS, 1 gram
This is used in conjunction with zirconium ion for making a reagent for the colorimetric determination of fluorides.

1-butaneboronic acid, 10 grams

Don't know.

o-tolidine, 50 grams
This is a reagent for the detection of free chlorine, also a nasty carcinogen.

alpha-amylase, 1 gram
beta-amylase, 1 gram
These sound expensive.

capsaicin, 1 gram
vitamin E (alpha tocopherol), 50 ml
folic acid, 10 grams

Make your own pepper spray/multivitamin?

garage chemist - 9-7-2007 at 11:15

Some of those are high-value organics, also some expensive natural substances. Capsaicin is worth around 80€ per gram.
Those enzymes are also expensive.

With alkylboronic acids like your butylboronic acid, very interesting organic coupling reactions are possible. Boronic acids are used in the Suzuki reaction.
http://www.organische-chemie.ch/OC/Namen/Suzuki.htm
Though you still need the special palladium complex that is required as a catalyst.

Phenylmercuric acetate seems to be a preservative, bactericide and fungicide for medicines and other health products. A google search for Phenylquecksilberacetat reveals products containing it, always in very small amounts. I am sure that it is a very nasty poison in higher concentrations, and especially as a pure substance!

Capsaicin is the active "hot" principle of chili peppers, and a powerful irritant to mucous membranes.

woelen - 9-7-2007 at 13:44

Hmmm... after reading the responses, I have serious doubt that I will ever use those organic chemicals. This is not the kind of stuff I normally use in my experiments. I like the simple inorganics ;). Maybe the capsaicin can be used for some 'fun' stuff, but the pure substance must be REALLY HOT :D.

I forgot a few chemicals from the stuff I have, but I think they are in the same line of weirdness:

tiron, disodium 4,5-dihydroxy-m-benzenedisulfonate, 5 grams
2-bornanone synthetic, 50 grams
cortisone, 250 mg
methyl p-hydroxobenzene, 100 grams
pyrogallol red indicator, 5 grams
N-(2-hydroxyethyl)-piperazin, 50 ml
2-mercapto 1-methyl imidazole, 5 grams
sodium taurodeoxycholate hydrate, 1 g

I have looked up all of these and found the structure, but still I have no idea how they can be put to good use.

I did not yet open any container of those organics. I have no idea of most of these chemicals, for some I searched the MSDS, but many are not easily found.

[Edited on 10-7-07 by woelen]

Nerro - 9-7-2007 at 14:08

Be carefull with the organomercuric and the capsaicin. I believe both are quite poisonous.

chromium - 9-7-2007 at 14:33

Xylenol orange, tiron and pyrogallol red are indicators for photometric determination of metals. Tiron mostly for Fe+3 (if i recall correctly), pyrogallol red for Co, Ni Pb, Bi. Xylenol orange has even longest list of metals.

If you do not want (or can not) use them for purporse you may want to make dilute solutions and experiment with color changes which occur if you add dilute solutions of different metal salts.

[Edited on 10-7-2007 by chromium]

The_Davster - 9-7-2007 at 16:37

In my opinion:
Interesting:
-cortisone-topical steroid, good if you get excema(rashes) which I sometimes do, and my cream for it contains this as the active ingredient
-tetrazolium blue-contains a tetrazole ring and is therefore cool by default. Also an indicator for something
-capsaicin-thats a condiment, not a reagent:P I am so jealous:o
-butylboronic acid-as GC pointed out, cool coupling reactions(do they work with other Pd(0) compounds, or colloidal Pd?)

The phenylmercury acetate scares me, as does the o-toluidine, for their toxicity.

The rest are not so interesting, with the exception of the mildly interesting indicators above.

This guy must have been doing some interesting experiments.

garage chemist - 9-7-2007 at 17:22

Hmm, is that substance o-toluidine ot o-tolidine? Those are two different substances, the latter is a solid, the former a liquid.
The tolidine (solid) would indeed be a very nasty carcinogen. The toluidine would be toxic as well, it is o-methylaniline.

not_important - 9-7-2007 at 17:32

taurodeoxycholate is a bile acid surface agent - a soap or detergent. It's used in liver studies, and in isolating membrane proteins. Low toxicity.

Pure capsaicin takes caution in handling, think of it as the hottest chile pepper around. It's not toxic in the ordinary sense, but get a tiny speck in your eye or on sensitive skin and you'll really know it. It's used in some of the 'deep heating' creams, the 'heat' is the capsaicin doing its nerve stimulation.

2-bornanone is camphor, useful if you want to do molecular weight determinations, or some organic experiments.

phenymercury acetate is something to be careful of.

Sauron - 9-7-2007 at 18:02

Sounds like the fellow had eclectic interests.

A couple nutritional supplements, a few dyes & indicators, a pair of enzymes for fermenting higher alcohols (a very stinky process).

I disagree that p-chloroacetanilide is a methaqualone precursor. Particularly in absence of anthanilic acid and o-toluidine. o-Tolidine is not same as o-Toluidine.

I'd like to see a complete inventory but I don't see any pattern emerging from the partial list given.

Ozone - 9-7-2007 at 18:09

Very interesting list of chemicals. This guy had a lot of bread tied up in his work!

umkay...

The alpha amylase is for cleaving starch to yield maltose (you ned a glucoamylase to get to glucose, but many "amylase" preparations have this activity as well). The beta cleaves cellulose to yield cellobiose (and probably some glucose--also known as a type of cellulase--take some cellulose and make ethanol!). Both should be stored frozen in the dark; are your preparations liquid (maybe shot by now) or the solid protein (probably OK)? Both enzymes like pH 5-7 and temperatures between 30-45°C (for optimum turnover).

4-chloracetanilide is a precursor for all sorts of things, a protected chlorobenzene ring which can survive, among other things, nitration. Maybe this could be used to create a Grignard reagent which might homopolymerize? Or maybe deprotect it and reductively aminate it onto some polyketone to get a merrifield type polymer? Go for 1-chloro-3-bromo-5-iodo benzene?

Phenylmercuric acetate? Got me. Phenylmercuric chloride, though is useful for preparation of phenyl(trichloromethyl) mercury, which yields dichlorocarbene on heating (under non-alkaline conditions!). Poisonous (22mg/kg, rat, Merck). Fungicide.

Vit. E is a great topical for burns or as an antioxidant standard (in organic solvents).

Hmm 1 g of capsaicin at 15-16E6 Scovilles equals ~ 15 bhut jolokias or maybe 3000 jalopenos. Wash your hands before you go to the can!

Wild list of weird stuff! Unfortunately I haveto go eat so...

Cheers,

O3

sparkgap - 9-7-2007 at 18:41

Weird assemblage indeed... :o

Most have been covered already by the previous posters, so I'll pick up some of the remains:

4-aminohippuric acid, 5 grams

- This I remember to be useful more as a diagnostic in renal function than as an organic reagent.

5,5-diphenylhydantoin, 100 grams

- It's a drug for grand mal epilepsy. Dilantin, it is branded in most countries IIRC. :)

o-tolidine, 50 grams

- If this is the solid dimethyl benzidine, indeed a nasty carcinogen and a nice azo-coupling partner.

vitamin E (alpha tocopherol), 50 ml
folic acid, 10 grams

- you'd have better luck reselling these than using them in the lab. :p

methyl p-hydroxobenzene, 100 grams

p-cresol?

That's all I have from the top of my head.

sparky (~_~)

woelen - 9-7-2007 at 23:38

The o-tolidine is a slightly pink crystalline solid, it is not a liquid, as is o-toluidine. I'll be very careful with this one, you all have warned me very well for its carcinogenic properties.
Quote:
The alpha amylase is for cleaving starch to yield maltose (you ned a glucoamylase to get to glucose, but many "amylase" preparations have this activity as well). The beta cleaves cellulose to yield cellobiose (and probably some glucose--also known as a type of cellulase--take some cellulose and make ethanol!). Both should be stored frozen in the dark; are your preparations liquid (maybe shot by now) or the solid protein (probably OK)? Both enzymes like pH 5-7 and temperatures between 30-45°C (for optimum turnover).

The amylases are not solutions, they are dry powders. They were not stored in a fridge, but they were stored in the dark, at a reasonably cool place. Both bottles still are sealed.

Sauron - 9-7-2007 at 23:56

Dilantin is usually combined with phenobarbital in treatment of epilepsy. My gog takes the stuff.

I believe Ritalin also used same way.

I have about a Kg folic acid pharm grade LaRoche, also calcium pantothenate, also Nictotinamide (niacin), and thiamin. These are standard additives for fermentations (in small amounts) and this ties in with his amylases - he was planning to fernment to butanols most likely. You do not need amylases to ferment ordinary mashes for ethanol. A fuel alcohol project, but would have been a very stinky one.

But except for the nicotinamide I have never figured out any lab use for any of these.

The nicotinamide can be degraded to 3-cyanopyridine, or oxidized to its N-oxide, or a few other five finger exercises from Org.Syn. that pretty much are all dead enders.

[Edited on 10-7-2007 by Sauron]

Tsjerk - 10-7-2007 at 07:20

The methyl p-hydroxobenzene (You mean hydroxy, don't you?) can be used to do a Reimer-Tiemann reaction. Which I think is very interesting. After the Reimer-Tiemann reaction and methylation you would 2,5-dimethoxybenzaldehyde in this case.

Edit: Dimethoxy, not dimethyl
[Edited on by Tsjerk]

[Edited on by Tsjerk]

not_important - 10-7-2007 at 07:52

Quote:
Originally posted by Tsjerk
The methyl p-hydroxobenzene (You mean hydroxy, don't you?) can be used to do a Reimer-Tiemann reaction. Which I think is very interesting. After the Reimer-Tiemann reaction and methylation you would 2,5-dimethoxybenzaldehyde in this case.
[Edited on by Tsjerk]


Noo, you'd mostly have 2-methoxy,5-methyl-benzaldehyde as neither R-T nor ordinary methylation transform methyl groups into methoxy groups.

Tsjerk - 10-7-2007 at 07:57

Ofcourse your right... my bad. I was confused with 4-methoxyphenol. But as you say you would still be able to do a Reimer-Tiemann reaction.

Fleaker - 10-7-2007 at 20:13

Amylase eh? Ferment something hard to ferment :p

http://www.theethanolsource.com/product_info.php?products_id...


Slightly OT, but they have molecular sieve at a decent price:

http://www.theethanolsource.com/product_info.php?products_id...


For the others, no clue. This is perhaps my 3rd post in organic chemistry :o not so into it with the prevailing political clime.

dedalus - 12-7-2007 at 06:53

Quote:
Originally posted by Sauron
Sounds like the fellow had eclectic interests.

A couple nutritional supplements, a few dyes & indicators, a pair of enzymes for fermenting higher alcohols (a very stinky process).

I disagree that p-chloroacetanilide is a methaqualone precursor. Particularly in absence of anthanilic acid and o-toluidine. o-Tolidine is not same as o-Toluidine.

I'd like to see a complete inventory but I don't see any pattern emerging from the partial list given.


You are right, of course. I was thinking of o-chloro aniline.

The indicators could be used in all kinds of interesting ways to do colorimetric testing for metals.