THE PREPARATION OF SULFANILAMIDE OGDEN BAINE Southwestern, Memphis, Tennessee
I N VIEW of the great amount of publicity recently given to sulfanilamide (paminobenzenesulfonamide) and in consideration of the several fundamental type reactions involved in its preparation, the synthesis of this compound may profitably be included in the laboratory procedures of undergraduate organic chemistry. No elaborate apparatus is required, and the demands on the students' technical ability are not excessive. The reactions involved in the preparation of sulfanilamide from aniline are as follows.
In reaction (I) any of the usual methods of acetylation may be employed. Reaction (11) gives a maximum yield of eighty-five per cent., the only reaction of the series which cannot be made practically quantitative. Reaction (111) is carried out with aqueous ammonia, and the final step by boiling with dilute HCl. It is quite possible to complete the entire synthesis in two laboratory periods of four hours each. Reactions (I) and (111) may be modified so as to produce many other derivatives of sulfanilic acid.
' G n m ~ cdilor, , "Organic Syntheses." Collective Volume I. John Wiley & Sons, New York City, Inc., 1932, pp. &9. GELMO, I.fimkt. Chen., 77, (Z),371 (1908).
A THERMOREGULATOR OF EASY CONSTRUCTION GEORGE H. BURROWS University of Vermont, Burlington, Vermont
THE mercury-in-glass thermoregulator shown in the accompanying figure is easily made and easily managed. It avoids need of sealing platinum into glass, and i t is very readily filled. The make-and-break contact is shown a t the left. The ordinary glass stopcock is lubricated with flake graphite instead of with grease; the graphite by its conductivity completes the circuit when the regulator is in use and the stopcock closed. The wires may conveniently be of Nichrome, or of platinum. If the mercury used is purified in the usual Victor Meyer apparatus, insertion of a short column of carbon tetrachloride between the mercurous nitrate solution and the mercury prevents clogging on long standing through formation of a basic nitrate.
