'Designer vinegars' have become very popular over the past decade. Vinegars made from champagne, merlot, and other wines are but a few of these. All wines contain ethanol, and these vinegars are simply wines containing microorganisms that have caused oxidation of the ethanol present. If vinegar is simply ethanol that has been oxidized, what is the structure of the acid formed?

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Hi, everyone. Welcome back. Our next problem says the era derivatives of the industrial chemical and then in quotations, acid of butter are widely used as food and perfume additives. The quotes acid of butter is also formed in the body when one butanol is completely metabolized, facilitated by an enzyme. One butanol is converted to butanol which is further converted to acid. If the acid of butter is simply the oxidized form of one butanol, what is the structure of the acid? And we have four different uh answer choices. Each of which has a carbon group in it. Then we need to match this with our product. We expect when one butanol is completely oxidized. So first, we need to look at what the structure of one butanol is because the final oxidized form of an alcohol depends on its structure. So one butanol would be simply butane, a four carbon chain ending in an alcohol group. So we'll draw that here. So four carbons, ch, three, ch, two ch, two, ch two and then an alcohol group. So this is a primary carbon. Our carbon has only one R group, which is the rest of the chain and primary carbons can get completely oxidized to form a carboxylic acid. And the first step, they're oxidized to an aldehyde. And in the second step to a carboxylic acid, and that's what we're being asked for here. So this is what is the structure of the acid. So in this case, we'd want to say we have our butanol. So first, it will be converted to an aldehyde group. So in that case, instead of our fourth carbon being CH two, we lose one of the hydrogens and it's now ch and then a double bond to an O. So this would be one Butan or just Butan. So we have an aldehyde group where there was an alcohol on that fourth carbon. But we're still out to our carboxylic acid, we need one more step. So again, we have our first three carbons, ch three, ch two, ch two and that final carbon has a double bond to oxygen. And then instead of just a hydrogen, it now has an hydroxy group and oh to form the carboxylic acid. So this is our acid structure. So we want to compare it to the answer choices we have. If we look at choice a, we have four carbons with the AL HRL group correctly attached to carbon four. But the carbonel group is in the wrong place. It's shown on carbon three instead of carbon four, I like that in red there. So that's in the wrong place. So Choice A is incorrect. Choice B shows us a carbonel group but it's in the form of a ketone. The double bond is in the wrong place just like in choice A on carbon three. And then it shows a methyl group happening on carbon four. So Choice B also the incorrect structure. Now we go to choice C. Well, here our carbonel group is on the correct carbon four. But this is showing us the aldehyde, not the acid. So the intermediate product, not the completely oxidized form. So choice C is incorrect. So just by process of elimination, we have choice D as our answer. And indeed, we see our three carbons and then our carboxylic acid on carbon four, we have a double bond to oxygen and a single bond to oh. So choice D is our correct answer for the structure of the completely oxidized form of one butanol. See you in the next video.

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Key Concepts

Ethanol Oxidation

Acetic Acid Structure

Microbial Fermentation