Given that the structures of cocaine (on the right side of the equation) and its free base ( on the left side) with an H+ :
a. Would you expect K for the cocaine to be greater or less than 1.0? Explain.
b. Would K for the free base be higher or lower than for cocaine? Explain.
c. If you were going to extract cocaine into dichloromethane (an immiscible organic solvent) from
an aqueous solution, would you make the aqueous solution acidic or basic? Explain why.
1 answer
depending on the reaction taking place, the k values would be different: if the Cocaine is a product, then the pH is being lowered (due to the addition of the H+ ion). Thus the concentration of *C cocaine* would be higher than the *C freebase*. Meaning the K value would be lower than 1.0 (since the C cocaine is the denominator in the equation).
1 answer