Purification of Laboratory Chemicals

Rating:
Summary: An Absolute Essential for Chemists!
Review: As a chemist, I am often in need of techniques for purification of various chemicals. Often time is a constraint and the "best" technique may be too time consuming, if one even knows what it is. This text offers several alternatives to the purificatin of most common compounds (especially solvents), including the best way to make the compound pure as well as other known techniques. One can then choose, based on the reaction one is doing whether one needs to use the best techniques or the fastest technique to get mostly pure material or somewhere inbetween. Unfortunately, often the text does not list the actual percent purity that each technique can yield (though it is often easy enough to guess which methodology will yield the best results.) An invaluable resource for any chemist, but especially for graduate students.

Rating:
Summary: An Absolute Essential for Chemists!
Review: As a chemist, I am often in need of techniques for purification of various chemicals. Often time is a constraint and the "best" technique may be too time consuming, if one even knows what it is. This text offers several alternatives to the purificatin of most common compounds (especially solvents), including the best way to make the compound pure as well as other known techniques. One can then choose, based on the reaction one is doing whether one needs to use the best techniques or the fastest technique to get mostly pure material or somewhere inbetween. Unfortunately, often the text does not list the actual percent purity that each technique can yield (though it is often easy enough to guess which methodology will yield the best results.) An invaluable resource for any chemist, but especially for graduate students.

Rating:
Summary: Great for the Organic Chemist
Review: Like Carey & Sundberg, Jerry March, the Aldrich catalog, and the Merck Index, (etc.), this book should be a benchmate for the Organic Chemist. It is very good when one requires the purification of reagents, or the drying/purification of solvents. The protocols for purification are usually pretreatment followed by distillation or recrystallization, and can be carried out to give anywhere from moderately pure material, to giving the pure, pure substance.

Excellent for the research organic chemistry graduate student or the pharmaceutical industrial research chemist who likes to start with the purest materials, so as to leave only the investigative variables open to question.

However, in industry, although FedEx-ing new and pure reagents (and disposal of the old questionable ones!) is the easiest and encouraged method for research, it is often found that purification is totally appropriate--in these instances, Purification of Laboratory Chemicals (D.D. Perrin & W.L.F. Armarego) is highly recommended.

Rating:
Summary: Great for the Organic Chemist
Review: Like Carey & Sundberg, Jerry March, the Aldrich catalog, and the Merck Index, (etc.), this book should be a benchmate for the Organic Chemist. It is very good when one requires the purification of reagents, or the drying/purification of solvents. The protocols for purification are usually pretreatment followed by distillation or recrystallization, and can be carried out to give anywhere from moderately pure material, to giving the pure, pure substance.

Excellent for the research organic chemistry graduate student or the pharmaceutical industrial research chemist who likes to start with the purest materials, so as to leave only the investigative variables open to question.

However, in industry, although FedEx-ing new and pure reagents (and disposal of the old questionable ones!) is the easiest and encouraged method for research, it is often found that purification is totally appropriate--in these instances, Purification of Laboratory Chemicals (D.D. Perrin & W.L.F. Armarego) is highly recommended.

Rating:
Summary: Great for the "Synthetic" Chemist
Review: This is an indispensible resource for any synthetic chemist, either organic or inorganic (not sure about the biochemical section). This book has concise, informative entries on the purification of a vast number of common solvents and reagents. I don't know how any chemist can survive without having this on his/her bookshelf!

Rating:
Summary: Great for the "Synthetic" Chemist
Review: This is an indispensible resource for any synthetic chemist, either organic or inorganic (not sure about the biochemical section). This book has concise, informative entries on the purification of a vast number of common solvents and reagents. I don't know how any chemist can survive without having this on his/her bookshelf!