Methyl benzoate Totally Explained

Everything about Methyl Benzoate totally explained

| Section2 = | Section7 = }}
Methyl benzoate is an ester with the chemical formula C₆H₅COOCH₃. It is formed by the condensation of methanol and benzoic acid. It is a colorless to slightly yellow liquid that's insoluble with water, but miscible with most organic solvents.
   Methyl benzoate has a pleasant smell, strongly reminiscent of the fruit of the feijoa tree, and it's used in perfumery. It also finds use as a solvent and as a pesticide used to attract insects.
   However drug searching dogs are trained to detect the smell of methyl benzoate because of its connection to cocaine. Cocaine hydrochloride, though in its purest form odorless, naturally decomposes the benzoyl group on the cocaine molecule from the remnants of chemicals used in processing it, producing methyl alcohol and benzole acid, which stabilizes after a short time into methyl benzoate.
   It is one of many compounds that's attractive to males of various species of orchid bees, who apparently gather the chemical to synthesize pheromones; it's commonly used as bait to attract and collect these bees for study.

Reactions

Electrophilic substitution: Methyl benzoate undergoes nitration with nitric acid in the presence of sulfuric acid, forming methyl 3-nitrobenzoate. This takes place when nitric acid is protonated and forms the NO₂⁺, nitronium cation. This cation is the electrophile and attacks the benzene ring to form methyl 3-nitrobenzoate.

Saponification: Methyl 3-nitrobenzoate undergoes hydrolysis with addition of aqueous NaOH. The ester is converted into a carboxylic acid. The result is the sodium salt of the acid, which can be acidified with aqueous HCl to form 3-nitrobenzoic acid.Further Information

Get more info on 'Methyl Benzoate'.

External Link Exchanges

Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:

<a href="http://methyl_benzoate.totallyexplained.com">Methyl benzoate Totally Explained</a>

Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned.