Succinaldehyde or succindialdehyde is an

organic compound In chemistry, organic compounds are generally any chemical compounds that contain carbon- hydrogen or carbon-carbon bonds. Due to carbon's ability to catenate (form chains with other carbon atoms), millions of organic compounds are known. Th ...

with the formula (CH₂CHO)₂. Typical of other dialdehydes, succinaldehyde is highly reactive and is rarely observed as the dialdehyde. Usually, it is handled as the hydrates or methanol-derived

acetal In organic chemistry, an acetal is a functional group with the connectivity . Here, the R groups can be organic fragments (a carbon atom, with arbitrary other atoms attached to that) or hydrogen, while the R' groups must be organic fragment ...

. It is a precursor to

tropinone Tropinone is an alkaloid, famously synthesised in 1917 by Robert Robinson as a synthetic precursor to atropine, a scarce commodity during World War I. Tropinone and the alkaloids cocaine and atropine all share the same tropane core structure. It ...

. Succinaldehyde can used as a crosslinking agent for proteins, but it is less widely used than the related dialdehyde glutaraldehyde.

Preparation and reactions

Succinaldehyde is generated by the oxidation of

tetrahydrofuran Tetrahydrofuran (THF), or oxolane, is an organic compound with the formula (CH2)4O. The compound is classified as heterocyclic compound, specifically a cyclic ether. It is a colorless, water- miscible organic liquid with low viscosity. It is ...

with

chlorine Chlorine is a chemical element with the symbol Cl and atomic number 17. The second-lightest of the halogens, it appears between fluorine and bromine in the periodic table and its properties are mostly intermediate between them. Chlorine is ...

followed by hydrolysis of the chlorinated product. It can also be prepared by the

hydroformylation Hydroformylation, also known as oxo synthesis or oxo process, is an industrial process for the production of aldehydes from alkenes. This chemical reaction entails the net addition of a formyl group (CHO) and a hydrogen atom to a carbon-carbon d ...

acrolein Acrolein (systematic name: propenal) is the simplest unsaturated aldehyde. It is a colorless liquid with a piercing, acrid smell. The smell of burnt fat (as when cooking oil is heated to its smoke point) is caused by glycerol in the burning fa ...

or the acetals thereof. In aqueous solution, succinaldehyde quickly converts to the cyclic hydrate. In methanol it converts to the cyclic acetal, 2,5-dimethoxyl

References

{{Reflist Aldehydes