KINETIC-STUDIES ON THE PERMANGANIC OXIDATION OF AMINO-ACIDS - EFFECT OF THE LENGTH OF AMINO-ACID CARBON-CHAIN

The kinetic study of the permanganic oxidation of some amino acids (gl ycine, L-alanine, L-proportional to-amino-n-butyric acid, L-norvaline, and L-norleucine) has been carried out in buffered acid medium at 1 < pH < 3 using a spectrophotometric technique. An autocatalytic effect due to Mn2+ ions was found in all cases. The purpose of this work is t o study the influence of the length of carbon chain of the above amino acids. For it, structural factors such as steric, inductive, and hype rconjugation effects of the carbon chain were analyzed. It was found t hat the reactivity of these compounds is not affected by only one fact or, but the influence of several factors and the formation of intermed iate complexes could be included in these oxidative processes. (C) 199 7 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.