Major

Forensic Science

Anticipated Graduation Year

Senior

Access Type

Open Access

Abstract

Pyrogallol is a polyphenol formed from the decarboxylation of gallic acid found in tannins. Drinks like tea and coffee contain high levels of tannins that are responsible for staining of teeth and other surfaces. Purpurogallin is an oxidation product of pyrogallol. In this work, which was a collaboration with Professor Conrad Naleway’s research group in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, we developed a method to derivatize pyrogallol and purpurogallin and analyze the products by GCMS. The analytical challenge was to derivatize a crowded arrangement of -OH groups on neighboring carbons and get all to accept a derivatizing group, quantitatively.

Faculty Mentors & Instructors

Dr. James V. DeFrancesco, Senior Lecturer, Forensic Science/Chemistry and Biochemistry

Comments

thank you for holding this symposium despite the virus...jd

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.

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GC-MS Analysis of Pyrogallol and Purpurogallin

Pyrogallol is a polyphenol formed from the decarboxylation of gallic acid found in tannins. Drinks like tea and coffee contain high levels of tannins that are responsible for staining of teeth and other surfaces. Purpurogallin is an oxidation product of pyrogallol. In this work, which was a collaboration with Professor Conrad Naleway’s research group in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, we developed a method to derivatize pyrogallol and purpurogallin and analyze the products by GCMS. The analytical challenge was to derivatize a crowded arrangement of -OH groups on neighboring carbons and get all to accept a derivatizing group, quantitatively.