Extremely pungent, acrid and lachrymatory — an eye-watering, choking sharpness reminiscent of burnt fat or scorched vegetable oil. Not used in perfumery as an odorant; it is a toxic, highly reactive aldehyde with an unpleasant, suffocating character.AI · claude-opus-4-7
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Perfume and Flavor Chemicals, page 34.
Colorless mobile liquid.
Soluble about 30% in water, miscible with alcohol and oils.
Pungent, irritating odor (Acrolein is a lachrymator), unbearable to human mucous membranes or eyes. The odor resembles that of an extinguished stearin candle (in the vapors of which Acrolein is actually present). The odor is also classified as acrid.
Acrolein as such is rarely, if ever, used in perfumes or flavors, but it constitutes a very important intermediate material in Nature's and man’s synthesis of many important perfume and flavor materials. Acrolein is therefore often present in these as a trace impurity.
Acrolein can be produced by dehydration of Glycerin with Potassium bisulfate, or in vapor phase by passing the glycerin vapors over Magnesium sulfate.