Sarine McKenzie- 6/24/15

Hey guys! Well today I had loads of fun. Actually, I began the next step in my reaction, which was purifying my dithione through column chromatography, which is a very long process. It's not the most exciting, but I was able to learn something new, and that's always good. So basically the first part of my day was spent setting up my column, which involved me solidifying silica gel by dissolving it in DCM and pouring it into the column. Once I had a large amount of solidified silica gel, I was able to pour in my dithione, and wait for it to seep into the silica gel. After lunch, I began the actual purification of the dithione, by running DCM through the column. This was the most boring part, because I had to refill the DCM about every five minutes, so I spent like two hours sitting in my lab doing that. But was worth it, because watching the dithione separate from its impurities was very interesting. So that's pretty much it, all that's left is to evaporate the purified dithione, and tomorrow we'll recrystallize it with ethanol. Ciao for now!