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Subject - General Chemistry
The process to remove water from a chemical compound is called dehydration.
In general, dehydration (elimination of and ) is an intramolecular reaction which can be carried out using a variety of reagents, such as acids, oxidic catalysts or enzymes. In industry, important dehydration reactions are the formation of alkenes from alcohols (β-elimination), anhydrides from dicarboxylic acids, nitriles from amides, and lactones from hydroxycarboxylic acids. Intermolecular dehydration (elimination of and from two different molecules) yields ethers from alcohols and peptides from amino acids, for example.
Sometimes, the term dehydration is used for freeze-drying of food and removal of water from crystalline hydrates.