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Topic: Carbonic Acid and Alcohol  (Read 6401 times)

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Offline oneat

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Carbonic Acid and Alcohol
« on: December 23, 2009, 04:30:25 AM »
Do you know why Carbonic Acids Dissociate, but Alcohol not ?
I think that it's because Carbonic Acid are better polarised than Alcohol.
Am I right ?

And why only H+ ion dissociate not OH- in acids ?

Offline Mitch

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Re: Carbonic Acid and Alcohol
« Reply #1 on: December 23, 2009, 05:17:49 AM »
The usual answer we tell students is that the negative charge from the disassociated product is stabilized by the carboxylate group through resonance. An alcohol does not have resonance stabilization.
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Offline DrCMS

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Re: Carbonic Acid and Alcohol
« Reply #2 on: December 23, 2009, 05:57:57 AM »
The usual answer we tell students is that the negative charge from the disassociated product is stabilized by the carboxylate group through resonance. An alcohol does not have resonance stabilization.

Resonance stabilisation is why phenol behaves differently to say benzyl alcohol.

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