Cocaine Cocaine HCL Hydrolysis/Transesterification

[amqng]

Hi all!

After years of reading, finally posting something. Hope this helps others as well!

I can successfully make an A/B extraction, but there is one thing bugging my mind: I have read about how problematic it is to solve cocaine hcl in water or use water as a solvent in the neutralization reaction. From what I understood, when using water or alcohol (ethanol, but not sure if IPA as well) it would screw up the cocaine molecules through hydrolysis/transesterification.

The thing is I didn’t find any evidence of that online. On the contrary:
There are studies that show preservation of cocaine hcl in water solution (ph < 4.0 / room temperature) up to 45 days.

Can someone help me figure that out?

Also, I would like to thank you all, specially the masters: Le Junk, GC and Sekio. You people are out of this world.

 

[negrogesic]

In water cocaine hydrochloride can undergo hydrolysis, the speed at which it happens is pH and temperature dependent. I think it's fairly stable though at neutral pH and room temperature.

Transesterification of course cannot occur in water as there is no alkyl group, but can in ethanol, but I think the process is slow in lower concentrations of ethanol (even in something like vodka, which is still mostly water). How fast it occurs at high concentrations of ethanol (for example, say 90%), I'm not sure.