How many equivalent hydrogens does ethyl acetate have?

1 Answer
Dec 21, 2014

Ethyl acetate has three sets of equivalent hydrogens.

Explanation:

The structure of ethyl acetate is

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The molecule contains eight H atoms. Some of them are different from each other.

For example, the three H atoms on the left are attached to a carbon bonded to a C=O group.

They are different from the hydrogens on the CH₂ group, which is bonded to an O atom.

And the three H atoms on the right are different from the other two groups.

One way to check whether certain H atoms are equivalent is to replace each H atom with a group like Cl and see if you generate the same compound.

Replacing any H atom on the left hand C gives ClCH₂COOCH₂CH₃.

Replacing any H atom on the CH₂ group gives CH₃COOCHClCH₃.

Replacing any H atom on the right hand C gives CH₃COOCH₂CH₂Cl.

These are three different compounds, so there are three sets of equivalent H atoms.

The NMR spectrum for ethyl acetate confirms this prediction.

chemwiki.ucdavis.edu

The signal at 1.83 ppm corresponds to the #"H"_"A"# hydrogens.

The signal at 1.05 ppm corresponds to the #"H"_"C"# hydrogens.

The signal at 3.91 ppm corresponds to the #"H"_"B"# hydrogens