Extraction of copper(II) carboxylates with chloroform under substoichiometric conditions

The features are considered of binding carboxylic acids (HR) as dimeric solvated copper(II) complexes at the copper(II) extraction with chloroform under substoichiometric conditions, with excess of the metal ion in the aqueous phase. The fundamental difference in the optimization of the quantitative extraction of copper(II) in the form of any carboxylate with a maximum ratio of Cu:R and the total binding with carboxylic acids to form the copper complex of the minimum stoichiometry was noted. It was found that quantitative binding of HR occurred at the extraction of mixed-ligand acetate-carboxylate copper(II) complexes without control over the aqueous phase acidity when acetic acid medium or copper(II) acetate was used, but not copper chloride, nitrate, perchlorate, or sulfate. The possibility of determination by extraction-photometric method by the color of the Cu(II) complex was shown that was suitable only to those carboxylic acids, whose logarithm of the partition coefficient in the water-chloroform mixture was higher than three.