How do chemists make epoxides?

1 Answer
Jul 7, 2017

They use "meta-chloroperoxybenzoic acid"meta-chloroperoxybenzoic acid

Explanation:

And thus the basic reaction is............

"olefin "stackrel(MCPBA)rarr" epoxide....."olefin MCPBA−−− epoxide.....

And this is a powerful organic reaction, in that you can (potentially) make 2 chiral centres from an olefin, i.e. from R_1R_2C=CR_3R_4R1R2C=CR3R4 to give R_1R_2(HO)C-CR_3R_4(OH)R1R2(HO)CCR3R4(OH) after the epoxide ring is oxidized up. Current methods of synthesis (e.g. "Sharpless peroxidation"Sharpless peroxidation) are good enuff to accomplish this end.

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