Fluoroalcohols are
organofluorine compounds consisting of an
alcohol
Alcohol may refer to:
Common uses
* Alcohol (chemistry), a class of compounds
* Ethanol, one of several alcohols, commonly known as alcohol in everyday life
** Alcohol (drug), intoxicant found in alcoholic beverages
** Alcoholic beverage, an alco ...
functional group
In organic chemistry, a functional group is any substituent or moiety (chemistry), moiety in a molecule that causes the molecule's characteristic chemical reactions. The same functional group will undergo the same or similar chemical reactions r ...
with at least one
C-F bond. These compounds often have distinctive solvent properties.
Perfluoroalcohols
Most primary and secondary perfluoroalcohols are unstable, for example
trifluoromethanol eliminates
hydrogen fluoride
Hydrogen fluoride (fluorane) is an Inorganic chemistry, inorganic compound with chemical formula . It is a very poisonous, colorless gas or liquid that dissolves in water to yield hydrofluoric acid. It is the principal industrial source of fluori ...
, forming
carbonyl fluoride. This reaction is reversible.
:
Stable perfluorinated alcohols include
nonafluoro-tert-butyl alcohol ((CF
3)
3COH) and
pentafluorophenol
Pentafluorophenol is the organofluorine compound (specifically a fluoroalcohol) with the formula . This is the perfluorinated analogue of phenol. It is a white solid that melts just above room temperature, and smells of phenol. With a pKa, p''K''a ...
(C
6F
5OH).
Partially fluorinated alcohols
Numerous partially fluorinated alcohols are known and have useable stabilities.
Trifluoroethanol and
hexafluoroisopropanol are used as solvents in research.
[{{cite journal , doi=10.1038/s41570-017-0088, title=Hexafluoroisopropanol as a Highly Versatile Solvent , year=2017 , last1=Colomer , first1=Ignacio , last2=Chamberlain , first2=Anna E. R. , last3=Haughey , first3=Maxwell B. , last4=Donohoe , first4=Timothy J. , journal=Nature Reviews Chemistry , volume=1 , issue=11 , url=https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:72dc250a-656e-4367-827d-17835acc28ba ] Fluorotelomer alcohols are precursors to
perfluorocarboxylic acids.
Pirkle's alcohol is used a
chiral shift reagent in
nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy
Nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, most commonly known as NMR spectroscopy or magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS), is a Spectroscopy, spectroscopic technique based on re-orientation of Atomic nucleus, atomic nuclei with non-zero nuclear sp ...
.
References
Organofluorides
Alcohols