Question

Is Citric Acid Optically Active?

Answer 1

Optically Active: The Optically Activity of an organic compound tells us about the property of organic compounds by which when plane-polarized light is passed through a solution of an organic compound, the organic compound bends plane-polarized light.

• These compounds are also called active compounds.
• Optical activity has two types: Dextrorotatory and Laevorotatory.

Chirality: Chiral or stereocenter is structure that is asymmetric and non-superimposable on its mirror image. This property of the compound is called salinity.

Citric Acid: Citric Acid is a weak organic acid that has the chemical formula of C₆H₈O₇.

• A citric acid is a naturally occurring organic acid. It has a molar mass of 192.124 gmole^−1.
• It can be dissolved in water, alcohol, acetone etc. easily.
• Citric acid had very high pH and acidity.
• Following figure represent the structure of Citric Acid:
• 
• After observing the structure of Citric acid, we can say that Citric acid does not contain a chiral carbon and does not show any stereoisomerism.
• Since, Optically Active and Chirality properties are required for a compound to be optically active.
• Hence, Citric Acid is not Optically Active.