Question

What does this sentence mean:

"Each student dissolved their oil in toluene, added Cs2CO3, and refluxed the suspension for at least 20 min to equilibrate the nepetalactones."

Does it mean that using toluene, Cs2CO3, and reflux that the isomers present will somehow become equal in quantity??  

Answer 1

Step 1: Oil is added to toulene .

Step 2: Cs2CO3 is added.

Step 3: the suspension is refluxed. ( A suspension is a heterogeneous mixture in which the solute particles do not dissolve, but get suspended throughout the bulk of the solvent, left floating around freely in the medium).  

So Cs2CO3 is not soluble in the oil-toulene mixture and the particles are suspended throughout.

There is no mention about the reactant(oil) present so I cannot comment over that after reflux the isomers will be in equal amount or not.