Preparation of Aldehydes and Ketones

Two Ways to Build the Carbonyl Group

Having seen how the carbonyl group is put together electronically in 8.1, the natural next question is how a chemist actually installs a $\text{C=O}$ into a molecule. The methods split into two kinds:

• Routes common to both classes — reactions that give an aldehyde or a ketone depending on the starting material used (oxidation and dehydrogenation of alcohols, and reactions starting from hydrocarbons).
• Routes specific to one class — methods engineered so that the product is only an aldehyde (never over-reduced or over-oxidised to something else) or only a ketone. …