2.4.6- trinitrophenol synthesis

Chemistry Chloropicrin s first reported preparation, by the Scottish scientist John Stenhouse, was in 1848 and involved the reaction of a chlorinating agent (bleaching powder) with picric acid (iym-trinitrophenol). It is this synthesis that led to the name chloropicrin, even though the ring present in picric acid is absent in the product chloropicrin. 

During World War I, the American subsidiary of the Bayer Company bought as much phenol as it could from the international market, knowing that eventually all the phenol could be converted into aspirin. This left little phenol available for other countries to purchase for the synthesis of 2,4,6-trinitrophenol (TNT), a common explosive. 

The synthesis of metal derivatives of strongly acidic phenols such as 2,4,6-trinitrophenol (picric acid) and 2,4-dinitrophenol (Eq. 6.16 ) is typically carried out in the presence of water or other protic solvents such as acetone/alcohol mixtures. 

For military and gun applications black powder continued to be the only explosive of choice as a propellant or bursting charge until the inventions of the late 1800s, when smokeless powder, based on nitrocellulose, proved to be a cleaner, safer, and more effective propellant than black powder. The synthesis of picric acid (2,4,6-trinitrophenol) followed... 

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