Question

When t-butanol and n-butanol are separately treated with a few drops of dilute `KMnO_(4)` in one case only, the purple colour disappears and a brown precipitate is formed. Which of the two alchols gives the above reaction and what is the brown precipitate?

Answer 1

Only n-butyl alcohol is oxidised under the reaction conditions while tertiary butyl alcohol fails to react.
`underset("n-butyl alcohol")(CH_(3)CH_(2)CH_(2)CH_(2)OH)+underset("(Purple)")(KMnO_(4))rarrunderset("Pot. salt of n-butyric acid")(CH_(3)CH_(2)CH_(2)COOK)+underset("Brown ppt.")(MnO_(2))+H_(2)O`