Methanol is metabolized in the body into formaldehyde and formic acid, which are highly toxic. Formic acid can damage the optic nerve, leading to blindness, and cause severe metabolic acidosis and multi-organ failure.
The offending substance in the liquor tragedies leading to blindness, etc. is
Asked in UPPCS Prelims 1996 · Topic: Alcohol (Industrial Synthesis and Applications of Alcohols (Ethanol production, methanol toxicity, solvents, fuels))
More Chemistry questions
- Which is used in alcoholic beverages?
- Which one of the following is a false statement?
- Match the items of Column – I with items of Column – II Column – I (i) Methanol (ii) Conversion of 2° alcohol into ketone (iii) Denaturation of alcohol (iv) Ethanol Column – II (a) Fermentation of sugars (b) Wood spirit (c) CrO$_3$ (d) Copper sulphate and pyridine
- The alcohol whose ingestion of even small quantities causes blindness - - (5) Question not attempted
- Which of the following is not a distilled liquor?
- Which of the following liquors is made from apples?
- By mistake a student mixed acetone with alcohol. The alcohol and acetone may be separated by which of the following process?
- $\text{R}-\text{C}_{||}^{=0}-\text{H} + 2\text{H} \xrightarrow{\text{Pt or Pd}} \text{Main product}$ Main product is - $ \text{R}-\text{CH}_{2}-\text{OH}$ - $\text{R}- \underset{\text{R}}{\underset{|}{C}}-\text{OH}$ - $\text{R}-\underset{\underset{|}{R}}{C}- \text{OH}$ - $\text{R}-\text{O}-\text{R}$
