Question

What is silver mirror test ? Explain with reaction?

Answer 1

Answer:

Bernhard Christian Gottfried Tollens (1841-1918) was a German chemist whose name has been recognised through the silver mirror test using Tollens' reagent. He developed this test to differentiate between aldose and ketose sugars.

Tollens' reagent is an alkaline solution of ammoniacal silver nitrate and is used to test for aldehydes. Silver ions in the presence of hydroxide ions come out of solution as a brown precipitate of silver(I) oxide, Ag2O(s). This precipitate dissolves in aqueous ammonia, forming the diamminesilver(I) ion, [Ag(NH3)2]+. Ketones do not react with Tollens' reagent.

2Ag+ (aq) + 2OH- (aq) Ag2 O(s) + H2 O(l)