Oxidation of Some Aliphatic Aldehydes by Chloramine-t

Kinetic studies on the oxidation of acetaldehyde, propionaldehyde, nand tso-butyraldehyde have been made using diloramine-T as an oxidising agent in an alkaline medium. The reactions followed almost identical kinetics being first order with respect to both aldehyde and chloramine-T. The order with respect to alkali has been found to be almost equal to unity (0.8 to 0.90) . Effect of an increase in the ionic strength was negligible while that of the addition of ethyl alcohol was negative. A mechanism involving the interaction of the enol anion of the aldehyde with chloramine-T best fits the kinetics data. Other possibilities have also been examined. Corresponding acids were found to be the oxidation products.