Physical Properties of Diethyl Ether Preparation and Properties
- It is a colourless liquid with a pleasant smell.
- It is highly volatile and inflammable liquid.
- It is lighter than water and insoluble in it.
- It is completely miscible in organic solvents like alcohol, benzene etc.
- It is used as an anaesthetic.
- Bailing point of diethyi ether is 307.6 K.
- Structure of Diethyl Ether : Oxygen atom is sp3 hybridised in ether molecule.
→ Two sp3 hybrid orbitais of the oxygen atom overlap with sp3 hybrid orbitais of two ethyl groups forming o-bond. The remaining two sp3 hybrid orbitals contain a lone pair of electrons.
→ In this way two bond pair and two lone pair surround the oxygen in tetrahedral form. But C—O—C bond angle is 1100 instead of 109° 28’. This is due to repulsion between alkyl groups.
→ As the size of alkyl group increases bond angle also increases due to greater repulsive interactions.
→ Thus, ethers have angular structure and dipole moment is 1.3 D.
