Spectrophotometric Analysis of Commercial AspirinHoa ChungChemistry 1A Spring2016, April 14, 2016Objective/PurposeThe purpose of this experiment was to quantify the concentration of Acetyl Salicylic Acid(ASA) in commercial aspirin by spectrophotometry.TheoreticalThe mass of acetylsalicylic acid present in the tablets was determined usingspectrophotometric analysis. Because acetylsalicylic acid is colorless, it was hydrolyzed to formsalicylate, which in turn was reacted with the reagent Fe3+ion in acid solution to bring out thecolor. A colored compound absorbs light with a certain wavelength. A calibration curve wasgenerated from a standard solution of acetylsalicylic acid. This curve was fit with Beer’s Law,A = ε x b x cWhere A is the absorbance (arbitrary units), ε is the molar absorptivity of the particular absorbingspecies in (M.cm)-1, b is the path length of the cuvette (cm), and c is the concentration of the
