How to make Banana, Mushroom, Orange, and Pear Flavoring (Acetate Esters)

Organic esters tend to be smelly molecules. Some of them are pleasant smelling, while others are quite pungent and unpleasant.

In this video, we will be using acetic anhydride to acetylate 1-pentanol to make banana flavoring.

The same reaction can be carried out on several other alcohols, however, to make other scents, such as mushroom, orange, or pear.

[lemonstealinghorsdoeuvre]

8 years ago: remember, this was made in a lab, so you should not eat it, or even try it.

Couple years ago: I'm making grape flavor from vinyl gloves. It tastes ok, but if I have enough, it will keep all birds away and possiblykill them. Next week I'm going to make water out of diamonds and drink the most expensive water ever

Today: I am renting an island to make the smelliest chemical known, notorious for making an entire town vomit and getting even more noxious as the chemical is diluted and dispersed. Good thing the nearest houses are 200 yards away, down wind. Tune In next week when I drink paint thinner I have converted into cherry soda

[knottreel]

Something about watching these reactions is very relaxing.

[colinmartin]

Congrats Nigel, this video is being used by my Ochem 3 professor as a demo video!

[nathanielsellis]

I performed this exact experiment in my lab. When adding water to the solution to neutralize acetic anhydride, the solution in my round bottom flask boiled out (pretty much exploded out). I was able to save some of it to get the final product. Furthermore, maybe warn the students to use a dropwise neutralization of the acetic anhydride. Really pungent banana though! That was fun.

[aLmAnZio]

I remember doing this in chemistry, thank you so much for your video man!

All it really did demonstrate to me though, is how much I've seem to have forgotten of my chemistry knowlege...

[ryelyndesch]

Love your content! Finally taking organic chemistry and we're using this for a lab!

[liambryce]

what a lad, keeping it simple and explaining the chemistry behind it mah boi

[bluechem]

Did this for octyl acetate. Doing this with longer alcohols will mean you will lose less of your product in the washing steps but will require a higher temperature to distill at the end. For my reaction, I used 30mL of 1-octanol. After the reaction and washing steps, I dried the crude organic layer over MgSO4 for 15 minutes and filtered, then used an impromptu short path air condenser (made using the 75 degree and 105 degree joints with a short glass tube connecting them), then distilled the mixture under vacuum to yield 25.18g of crystal clear octyl acetate, 77.0% yield.

[Austingame]

When you said you would keep it basic, you lied







its acidic.

[pirobotbeta]

I tried my hand at home distilling ages ago; often there would be a strong banana smell to the distillate, but only a few milliliters came over before it cleared up.
All manner of stuff before and after the ethanol and even some furans for afters. Mmmm, wet cardboard smell!
Keep yer cuts clean, boys!

[YouMockMe]

I liked the colors, helped me understand what is going on

[kallah]

Nice!
Just what I needed for my 3, 6-dibenzoylmorphine reaction...

[thewhitelotus]

Thank you sir. This was very helpful!
From a chemistry teacher in training <3

[naifchen]

It do really reminds me of my time in the Lab.

[waspstomper]

Yeah, let me just go grab the acetic anhydride that I got from the walmart.

[marialiyubman]

You made me crave flavored mentos...
So you made mentos. :)

[fgoerlich]

I made isoamyl acetate today, smells like candy banana :)

[Aliza-yellow]

I will try it with glacial acetic acid

[FlorentVenhari]

I did a similar, much simpler experiment today in class. I added the Sodium Carbonate to my mixture too early! Literally, all the liquid just spilled out of the test tube :( Lol

[NecroBanana]

I don't need any more banana flavoring. Trust me.