Bollinger,+Meredith1

=// __Acetaminophen__ // =



 C 8 H 9 NO 2

 Acetaminophen, also known as paracetamol, is commonly used for the relief of headaches and other minor aches and pains, and is a major ingredient in numerous cold and flu remedies. Acetaminophen relieves pain by elevating the pain threshold, that is, by requiring a greater amount of pain to develop before a person feels it. It reduces fever through its action on the heat-regulating center of the brain. Specifically, it tells the center to lower the body's temperature when the temperature is elevated

Compared with many other drugs, paracetamol is much easier to synthesize, because it lacks stereocenters. As a result, there is no need to design a stereo-selective synthesis. Industrial preparation of paracetamol usually proceeds from nitrobenzene. A one-step reductive acetamidation reaction can be mediated by thioacetate. Paracetamol may be easily prepared in the laboratory by nitrating phenol with sodium nitrate, separating the desired //p // -nitrophenol from the //ortho // - byproduct, and reducing the nitro group with sodium borohydride. The resultant //p // -aminophenol is then acetylated with acetic anhydride. In this reaction, phenol is strongly activating, thus the reaction only requires mild conditions

Chemical and Physical Properties: - Molar Mass: 151.17 grams per mol - Density: 1.263 grams per cubic centimeter - Melting Point: 168 ° C  - Solubility: 14 milligrams per milliliter at 25<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 11px;">° C



Works Cited: http://www.3dchem.com/imagesofmolecules/Acetaminophen.jpg http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acetaminophen http://www.chemistryexplained.com/A-Ar/Acetaminophen.html http://www.medicinenet.com/acetaminophen/article.htm http://kswpgoodfriends.files.wordpress.com/2009/07/fda-acetaminophen.jpg

I thought it was very interesting to find out how pain medicine actually works in the body and how it reduces fevers. I also liked the artwork at the top of the page.

Some of the technical words were a bit hard to understand so i didn't completely know what was happening in the processes. It also would have been nice to see formulas or reactions for some of the procedures.

-EB