[sariel]

The questions is on the varying boiling points of different amines. It goes something along the lines of: "suggest reasons for the varying boiling points of the following substances", giving some values. The boiling point values are the following:

1-aminopropane : 48.5 deg. C
2-aminopropane : 2.4 deg. C
trimethylamine : 2.9 deg. C

It's obvious that 1-aminopropane can form Hydrogen bonds with itself (the permanent dipole interaction formed between the electronegative Nitrogen and the Hydrogen atoms) via the lone pair on the Nitrogen. The trimethylamine Nitrogen has no hydrogen atoms around it to form dipole interactions, so no way to form Hydrogen bonds - hence the low boiling point.
I can't, however, understand why 2-aminopropane would have such a low B.P. As far as I can see its van der Waals would be identical to both the other molecules and it does have Hydrogen atoms around it (albeit the shape is different) so I cannot see why it would be unable to form Hydrogen bonds (which is the only reason I presume it would have such a low boiling point?)

Completely confused here... Any help would be great!

~S

[sariel]

As a follow up, Wiki states that the boiling point is 32.4 deg. C - so I will assume that the teacher got something wrong (a typo I guess). So for now I'll go with that unless someone comes up with a convincing reason for why it SHOULD be 2.4.