The Synthesis and Analysis of Aspirin

Acetylsalicylic acid commonly known as aspirin is the most widely used drug in the world today. Its analgesic, antipyretic, and anti-inflammatory properties make it a powerful and effective drug to relive symptoms of pain, fever, and inflammation. The purpose of this experiment was to synthesize aspirin by reacting salicylic acid and acetic anhydride in the presence of phosphoric acid to form acetylsalicylic acid. After synthesis, the sample of acetylsalicylic acid was purified by recrystallization and TLC analysis was utilized to check the purity of the sample. The actual yield of aspirin synthesized was 0.546 grams and the theoretical yield was 2.628 grams, thus the percent yield was 20.77% resulting in a percent error of 79.22%. The Rf values of crude product, salicylic acid, and recrystallized product were 0.590 and 0.897, 0.818, and 0.606 and 0.879 respectively. Due to these Rf values, it was brought to the conclusion that the crude and recrystallized aspirin were composed of both salicylic acid and acetylsalicylic acid.