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Lab Manual:

Organic Titration
Determination of
Saturation
Experiment 1: Organic Titration
1

Objective Determine the unsaturation degree of fat oil through the halogen titration
Introduction
Fatty acids are a class of biologically important organic chemicals, consisting of a long carbon
chain with a carboxylic acid group at the end. They are the basis of all fats and oils we consume
in our diet. Fatty acids can be classified as saturated or unsaturated fatty acids. Unsaturated fatty
acids have at least one double bond in their carbon chain, while saturated fatty acid do not. This
double bond typically disrupts the London dispersion forces between fatty acids, giving
unsaturated fatty acids a lower melting point. Because of this, oils, which are liquid at room
temperature, are made of unsaturated fatty acids, while fats, which are solid at room temperature,
are made of saturated fatty acids. Unsaturated fatty acids can be made into saturated fatty acids
by a process called hydrogenation. Hydrogenation is an addition reaction between the
unsaturated fatty acid and hydrogen gas, with a metal (such as nickel) used to catalyze the
reaction. This process is commonly used in the manufacture of vegetable oil-based margarines,
where it is carefully controlled to make the fat more solid, but still spreadable and rich in certain
nutritionally valuable fatty acids. The double bond in unsaturated fatty acids is also capable of
reacting with other compounds, such as molecular halogens, by a similar addition reaction. In
fact, the degree of unsaturation of fatty acids is typically expressed as the iodine number, or the
number of grams of iodine that reacts with 100 g of fat. The iodine number can also be measured
using bromine. In this method, fats are titrated with a bromine solution (also called bromine
water). Bromine loses its brown color when it reacts with the unsaturated fatty acid, so the end
point is visible as a sudden appearance of the brown bromine color. This allows us to determine
how many moles of bromine reacted with the fatty acid double bonds, which can be converted
into an iodine number.

Apparatus and equipment

1) White tile
2) Conical flask
3) Dropper pipette. (Use the type of teat pipette usually fitted to Universal Indicator
bottles, that do not allow squirting eg Griffin.
4) Burette (filled with bromine water)
5) Boss
6) Clamp
7) Stand.
8) Chemicals
9) Bromine water (Harmful and irritant) 0.02 mol dm3 (This concentration does nothave to be
accurate, but if the concentration is reduced, less fat will be required to ensure sensible volumes
of bromine water are used.)
10) Volasil (Volasil 244 from BDH) (This is a mixture of organic chemicals which can act as a
solvent for this experiment.)
11) Cooking oil (animal)
12) Cooking oil (vegetable)
13) Olive oil.
PROCEDURE
1. Using a teat pipette, add 0.5 g of olive oil to 5 cm3 of Volasil in a conical flask.
2. Use a burette filled with a dilute solution of bromine water (0.02 mol dm3)
(Harmful and irritant). Read the burette.
3. Run the bromine water slowly into the oil solution. Shake vigorously after each
addition. The yellow colour of bromine disappears as bromine reacts with the oil.
Continue adding bromine water to produce a permanent yellow colour.
4. Read the burette. Subtract to find the volume of bromine water needed in the
titration.
5. Repeat the experiment with: 0.5 g of cooking oil (vegetable) and 0.5 g of
cooking oil (animal).

RESULT
Cooking oil

Tittre /

(animal) / g

(Cm3)
Olive oil/ g

Cooking oil

Tittre/

(vegetables) / g

(Cm3)

Tittre/ (Cm3)

Question
1. Which sample is the most saturated and which is the most unsaturated?
2. This comparison is only approximate. How could the method be improved?
3. What does unsaturated mean?

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