Studies on the Reduction of Terpenes with Sodium in Aqueous-ammonia

Part II. Synthesis of (+)-Isomenthol from Inverted Menthone

Abstract

The synthesis of (+)-isomenthol has been studied by several groups of workers, but their experiments proved to be far from satisfactory. In this investigation, it is now shown that (+)-isomenthol is obtained in a better yield from inverted menthone, a mixture of (-)-menthone and (+)-isomenthone, by a new reduction method using sodium in aqueous-ammonia.