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Compound sheet

Aroma molecule · ketone

6-pentyloxan-2-one

Smells ofcoconut, peach

Found in 1 ingredient. We hold no measured concentration for it in any of them yet, so we cannot say where it is strong enough to smell.

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Formula
—
Mass
170.25 g/mol
CAS
705-86-2
PubChem
—
Threshold · water
100 ppb
Class
ketone
Status
Key food odorant

01How little it takes

  • in water 66
  • in a food 66

ppb, log scale · tick = median of published values, bar = full range, from open-access paper tables (not reviewed)

02Where it turns up

  • Drinks1

of the 1 ingredient that contain it, by food group

03What it travels with

Too few ingredients to say what it travels with.

What does 6-pentyloxan-2-one smell like?

The key-food-odorant survey describes it as coconut, peach.

It is a key food odorant (intermediary): identified in the meta-analysis of 227 food samples as one of 57 intermediary odorants, which appear in 5–25% of foods. Source: Dunkel et al. 2014, Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 53, 7124–7143

Which foods contain 6-pentyloxan-2-one?

We list 1 ingredient that contain it, but presence is not the same as smell. What matters is how much is there compared with how little it takes to notice it. That ratio is the odour activity value (OAV): above 1, you can smell it.

Found in

Measured foods first, then real food profiles, then thin or composite records (marked). The figure beside each is how many compounds that ingredient has in total, not the amount of 6-pentyloxan-2-one in it. ✓n = sources that recorded the link.

How strong is 6-pentyloxan-2-one?

Orthonasal, in clean water: 100 ppb, from 1 published value.

Published thresholds

4 measured values from the literature, grouped by what was measured: a threshold smelled in clean water, tasted, or measured in a real food are different quantities and are not pooled.

Orthonasal, in clean water · 100 ppb ppbThe reference measurement — smelled in water. OAV is computed against this.
ThresholdMatrixSourcePaper
100 ppb water_odor Leffingwell —
In a food matrix · 31.0 ppb ppbMeasured in a real food, where the matrix shifts detection — not a clean-water value.
ThresholdMatrixSourcePaper
31.0 ppb water (food: reference standard (water)) Literature corpus —
Retronasal / in-mouth · 125 ppb ppbTasted rather than smelled — a different sense, not comparable.
ThresholdMatrixSourcePaper
125 ppb water_flavor Leffingwell —
Other matrix · 120 ppb ppbMeasured in a non-aqueous medium (oil, starch, cellulose).
ThresholdMatrixSourcePaper
120 ppb oil (sunflower oil) (food: gouda cheese) Literature corpus —

Only values we can attribute are listed. Where a compendium’s licence does not permit public attribution its figures are omitted, so every number here traces to a citable source.

Thresholds in published tables

MediumMedianRangeValuesPapersPapers agree?
air 51.4 µg/L air 36.8–66 21 one paper
food matrix 66 ppb 66–420 42 yes
unstated 66 ppb 0.001–66 55 no (4.8 decades)
water 66 ppb 10–66 32 yes

Numbers printed in open-access papers, grouped by the medium the table states. Median and full range; “agree” means two or more papers whose middle 80% of values sit within 100×. Not reviewed.

Is 6-pentyloxan-2-one safe to eat?

Not in FEMA GRAS publications 1–33. Of 3,367 listed flavoring substances, none match this compound or its other names. It may still be food-safe under other regulatory routes (FDA 21 CFR 172, EFSA, JECFA); check femaflavor.org for the authoritative current list.

6-pentyloxan-2-one questions

What does 6-pentyloxan-2-one smell like?

Sources describe 6-pentyloxan-2-one as coconut and peach. It is one of the key food odorants identified by Dunkel et al. (2014).

Which foods contain 6-pentyloxan-2-one?

We list 1 ingredient that contain 6-pentyloxan-2-one.

How strong is 6-pentyloxan-2-one?

The median of 1 published odour thresholds in water is 100 ppb.

Look up another compound — search by name, CAS number, PubChem CID, or FEMA #.

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Cite this analysis
Plain text
Compound Kitchen (2026). 6-pentyloxan-2-one compound data sheet. https://compkitchen.com/compound/6-pentyloxan-2-one. Accessed 2026-11-03.
BibTeX
@misc{compkitchen_compound_6_pentyloxan_2_one_compound_data_sheet_2026,
  title  = {6-pentyloxan-2-one compound data sheet},
  author = {{Compound Kitchen}},
  year   = {2026},
  url    = {https://compkitchen.com/compound/6-pentyloxan-2-one},
  note   = {Accessed: 2026-11-03}
}

Methodology DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.19719459 · CC BY 4.0 · Citations are a request, not a requirement.