Extracting the Caffeine from Coffee

[soccerman1435]

We bought Starbucks' Caffe Verona (which is pretty damn good, I must add), ground the beans, and extracted the caffeine from the liquid coffee using dichloromethane, a common extraction solvent in the Organic Chemistry Lab.

Check out my video: youtube.com/watch?v=Hi3IkZBnezE
(shameless promotion, I know...)

 

[PinkRose]

Hello "soccerman1435"

Welcome to the Coffee Forums!

I watched your video. It looked like quite a science project. Is there a story behind the video?

Rose

 

[CoffeeJunky]

I was thinking the same.
What was the purpose of the extraction?

 

[soccerman1435]

I was thinking the same.
What was the purpose of the extraction?

You'll never guess. I made this video for a high school calculus project. We demonstrated the calculus feature of "integration" by integrating the area under the caffeine proton signals to prove to the class that integration could be useful in determining how many hydrogens are present in a molecule.

 

[bprotsman]

You sound smart Soccerman, keep drinking coffee.