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dibutyl phthalate

fruity ester

Found in 6 ingredients across the CompKitchen flavor graph.

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

2D Lewis structure of dibutyl phthalate
2D Lewis Structure
Formula
C16H22O4
Molecular weight
278.34 g/mol
PubChem CID
3026 — full record on PubChem

Properties

Odor description
faint
Odor threshold — in a food matrix
3.4 ppb – 1966 ppb median 94.0 ppb · 3 published values · see all 3 with sources
Volatility
medium
CAS number
84-74-2
Retention index
1998
Not in FEMA GRAS publications 1-33. Of 3,367 listed flavoring substances, none match this compound name. May still be food-safe under other regulatory routes (FDA 21 CFR 172, EFSA, JECFA) — check femaflavor.org for the authoritative current list.

How this molecule is described

Sources disagree about odour more often than they disagree about chemistry. Rather than show one answer, here is every description on file with how many ingredient records carry it.

Descriptions on file

Ordered by how many independent descriptor streams give each wording, then by how often it appears. The bar is still replication — one source copied onto many ingredients scores high there — so the two can disagree.

faint odor FlavorDB 2.0, Flavordb Odor Column 2 sources agree
2
faint shown above FlavorDB 2.0
4

Bars are the share of ingredient records carrying each description. High agreement means the sources replicate each other — not necessarily that they are right.

Published thresholds

3 measured values from the literature. Grouped by what was actually measured — a threshold smelled in clean water, tasted in the mouth, or measured in a real food are three different quantities and are not pooled.

In a food matrix

3.4 ppb – 1966 ppb

Measured in a real food, where the matrix shifts detection — not a clean-water value.

Threshold Matrix Source Paper
3.4 ppb water (food: tomato) Literature corpus —
94.0 ppb water (food: unknown) Literature corpus —
1966 ppb water (food: beef) Literature corpus —

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

Found in

Measured impact first, then profile share

Every ingredient known to contain dibutyl phthalate. Ingredients with a measured concentration come first, ranked by odour activity; the rest follow by how large a share of that ingredient's profile this molecule is. The figure beside each is how many different compounds that ingredient has in total — not the concentration of dibutyl phthalate in it.

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