Evaluation of the dissolving sulfur power for dialkyl disulfides and investigation of the dissolving sulfur mechanism

Analytical results show that the disulfides produced as a product stream of the Merox process from certain oil field in China is a mixture of dialkyl disulfides in which the alkyl group contains one to five carbon atoms. At room temperature, the solubility of elemental sulfur in such mixed dialkyl disulfides containing 7.1 or 30 parts of diethylamine per 100 parts of mixed dialkyl disulfides by weight exceeds that in traditional sulfur solvent, carbon disulfide. The mechanism of dissolving sulfur is that under catalysis of diethylamine,a part of sulfur reacts with dialkyl disulfide, and the polysulfide formed dissolves further amount of sulfur. The fragmentation process of dialkyl polysulfide in mass Spectrometry is that the elemental sulfur is eliminated one by one until dialkyl disulfide is formed, then the fragmentation proceeds according to the fragmentation mechanism of dialkyl disulfide.