Question

Nowadays picric acid is prepared by treating phonel first with concentrated sulphuric acid which converts is to phenol -2,-4 disulphonoc acid, and then with concentrated nitric acid to get 2,4,6- trinitrophenol. Can you write the equations of the reactions involved?

Answer 1

$H_{2}S{O}_4$ is an oxidizing agent as well as a protecting group.

Nitric acid is an oxidizing agent and here $N{O}_2^{+}$ act as an electrophile.