Ethers

The chapter's final major topic is ethers, developed across the three sections that follow: how ethers are prepared (section 11.5.1), their physical properties (11.5.2), and their chemical properties (11.5.3) -- covering, in turn, the two general synthetic routes to an ether (alcohol dehydration and the Williamson synthesis), the physical consequences of an ether's inability to hydrogen-bond with itself despite still being able to accept hydrogen bonds from water, and ethers' generally low but not entirely absent chemical reactivity …