Tuesday, June 21, 2011

Question on Basic Strength of Protonated Alcohols

Why do protonated alcohols behave as weak bases?

1 comment:

  1. Bases are electron pair donors. Once an alcohol molecule gets protonated, the oxygen atom in the alcohol gets a positive charge. As oxygen atom is highly electronegative, it will be looking for ways to get rid of the positive charge developed due to protonation and not to give away the remaining pair of electron. Hence it is acts as a weak base.

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