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ReactionsEthers will burn very quickly when ignited. Ethers are generally volatile and flammable. At room temperature ethers react in air to form unstable peroxides. The peroxides they make when exposed to air are explosive. Consequently, we will not have you do any lab work with them. When kept away from air, they seem to be somewhat inert. There are no simple tests that I know of that can be performed to identify the presence of an ether in an unknown. They behave very much like alkanes in that sense, except that they are polar molecules; and the alkanes are nonpolar.
E-mail instructor: Sue Eggling Clackamas Community College |
