Ruthenium(VIII) catalysed Oxidation of some Organic Substrates

Chemical Laboratories, University of Allahabad, Allahabad-211 002 Manuscript received 6 June 1993, revised 16 August 1993, accepted 17 September 1993 Ruthenium(VIII) oxide catalysed oxidation of methanol, ethanol, hexylene glycol, glycerol, diethylene glycol and triethylene glycol by aqueous alkaline hexacyanoferrate(III) shows zero order kinetics in [oxidant] and inverse proportionality in [OH-]. Reaction throughout shows first order with respect to [Hexylene glycol] and [Glycerol] while in case of the ramaining four substrates, after showing first order kinetics initially the reaction becomes independant with respect to methanol, ethanol, diethylene glycol and triethylene glycol at their higher concentrations. An outer sphere mechanism via hydride ion transfer has been proposed