The phenolic lipids 3-(12-phenyldodecyl) catechol (la) and 3-(10-phenyldecy1) catechol (lb) were recently isolated from the sap of the Burmese lac tree, Melanorrhoea ustiate,'but neither their biological activities nor chemical properties are known. We tried to synthesize these lipids to carry out further studies on them. In an earlier work on synthesizing 3- alkylcatechols, eg urushiol, Yukawa et al. 2 alkylated catechol bistetrahydropyranyl ether ...
