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On the detection of morphine by formation of Turnbull’s Blue

Francisco Sánchez-Viesca * and Reina Gómez Gómez

Department of Organic Chemistry, Faculty of Chemistry, National Autonomous University of Mexico, Mexico City (CDMX), Mexico.
 
Research Article
World Journal of Chemical and Pharmaceutical Sciences, 2025, 06(01), 001-004.
Article DOI: 10.53346/wjcps.2025.6.1.0021
Publication history: 
Received on 18 December 2024; revised on 04 February 2025; accepted on 07 February 2025
 
Abstract: 
Morphine is a highly efficient analgesic and is still the stronger painkiller today, but also has strong addictive properties. The misuse, due to the euphoria that produces, makes indispensable have at hand a rapid and simple chemical test for morphine identification, like the assay studied in this communication. It employs potassium ferricyanide and ferric chloride as reagents that in contact with morphine gives rise to Turnbull’s blue, the blue colour observed in the test. It is based in a redox process that produces ferrous ferricyanide (reduction step) and 2,2’bimorphine (oxidation step), via a free radical mechanism and a coupling reaction.
 
Keywords: 
2,2’-Bimorphine; Ferric chloride; Free radicals; Potassium ferricyanide; Redox reaction; Turnbull’s blue
 
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Copyright information: 
Copyright © 2026 Author(s) retain the copyright of this article. This article is published under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Liscense 4.0