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Organic chemistry
Course: Organic chemistry > Unit 3
Lesson 1: Naming alkanes- Representing structures of organic molecules
- Naming simple alkanes
- Naming alkanes with alkyl groups
- Correction - 2-propylheptane should never be the name!
- Common and systematic naming: iso-, sec-, and tert- prefixes
- Naming alkanes with ethyl groups
- Alkane with isopropyl group
- Organic chemistry naming examples 2
- Organic chemistry naming examples 3
- Naming a cycloalkane
- Naming two isobutyl groups systematically
- Organic chemistry naming examples 4
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Organic chemistry naming examples 3
Organic chemistry naming examples 3, containing branching and cycles. Created by Sal Khan.
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- Hey so what would happen if the longest chain in a molecule was longer than the biggest ring? How would the nomenclature change? Like for example, if the longest chain attached to the cyclononane in the second molecule had 10 carbons instead of 7? Thanks
(16 votes)- In the case you describe you would use the 10 carbon chain as the main (parent hydrocarbon). In a tie though, the ring wins.(17 votes)
- is the c in cyclo not supposed to count for the alpabetical stuff?(5 votes)
- If the cyclo describes the main chain (parent hydrocarbon), then no. In a side chain it would count for the alphabetical stuff. Iso and cyclo are the only prefixes that are alphabetized, however in these videos iso is being excluded (poor iso).(13 votes)
- What's the difference between sec and iso?(7 votes)
- From what I understand, though I'm far from understanding it fully; this is the difference:
-iso- is used when the Carbon in the Group being attached to the Backbone / Core Structure is the 2nd Carbon (Secondary Carbon).
-sec- is used when the Carbon in the Group being attached to the Backbone / Core Structure is also connected to an additional 2 other Carbon Atoms.(1 vote)
- For the second organic compound, why can't you count the ring and the chain containing 7 carbon atoms as 1 long chain? Why must you count the ring and the side chain as separate?(8 votes)
- Confused. At, he says you number them so that #1 is starts with the "lowest" letter of the alphabet. I thought you make #1 the one that will make the next substituent the next lowest number, and only if there's a tie you then go alphabetically about the next one. Help? 6:18(2 votes)
- Correct. When you number the atoms in the ring, you make #1 the one that will give the next substituent the next lowest number. So the numbers in the ring are 1, 2, and 7.
But when you write the names of the substituents in the ring, you list them alphabetically with the numbers of the carbons to which they are attached. Since butyl < heptyl < propyl (b < h < p), the name becomes 1-t-butyl-7 heptyl-4-prorpylcyclononane.(10 votes)
- wait a minute, if tert butyl is 1 hen shouldn't heptyl be six?(3 votes)
- Tertbutyl is a special case, described at: http://www.khanacademy.org/science/organic-chemistry/v/common-and-systematic-naming-iso--sec-and-tert-prefixes @. It means the carbon attached to the main group is attached to 3 carbons in its named group of 4 carbons. Butyl means 4, pentyl means 5, hexyl means 6, heptyl means 7. 6:30(3 votes)
- At, Sal mentions two candidates for the core structure of the molecule: (1)the heptyl group and (2) the cyclononyl group. The cyclononyl group is larger so he uses it as his core structure. But why didn't he use the tetradecane group that goes from the end of his heptyl group to the end of his "tert"-butyl group? 3:55(1 vote)
- He didn't use it because you can't continue across one side of the ring to make a longer chain. When you've got a cycloalkane, the naming rules say it's treated as its own group.(5 votes)
- If Sal is talking about organic chemistry names, does that mean that these molecules occur in nature?(1 vote)
- No. There are many organic molecules are artificial, and lots of inorganic molecules that occur in nature. Organic synthesis is a significant area of ongoing research in chemistry.(4 votes)
- what is the systematic name for tert-butyl(2 votes)
- how would you name a compound that has as a back bone a long chain and to it connected a ring (with less carbons than the chain) and to the ring connected another (let say short) chain?(2 votes)
Video transcript
We've got a few more molecular
structures to name, so let's look at this first
one right here. The first thing you always want
to do is identify the longest chain. If we start over here, we have
one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten,
eleven, twelve, thirteen carbons, looks pretty long. Now what if we start
over here? This looks like it could also
be a long chain: one, two, three, four, five, six, seven,
eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen. So we have two different chains,
depending on whether we want to go up here or whether
we go over here, that have a length of thirteen. So you're probably asking, which
chain do you choose? You should always, if we have
two chains of equal lengths and they're the longest chains,
you pick the one that will have more branches or
more alkyl groups on it. So this group right here, if we
pick this from here to here as our chain, we only have
one group on it, that group up there. If we pick this chain, starting
over here and then going over here, we have
two groups on it. We would have this group over
here and then we would have this group over here. This is the better chain
to use because it has more groups on it. It has more groups,
but the groups are smaller and simpler. So let's start counting. And the direction we want to
count, we always want to start on the side of the chain where
we're going to encounter something first, and everything
is closer this end of the chain so we'll
start counting here. One, two, three, four, five,
six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen, so
we have thirteen carbons on our main chain. Let me draw our main chain. So our main chain is this thing
in orange I'm drawing right here. That is our main chain. Thirteen, that's
three and ten. The prefix is tridec- and it's
tridecane because we have all single bonds here, so
it's tridecane. Tridecane is the main chain. Then we have two groups
over here. This one in green, this only has
one the carbon branching off of the main chain, so it's
prefix will be meth- and it'll be a methyl group, so
that is methyl. That is a methyl group
right there. Then this one down here, we have
one, two, three carbons. the prefix is prop-, so this
is a propyl group. And the methyl is sitting on the
three carbon of our main chain and the propyl group is
sitting on the four carbon: one, two, three, four. Now when we figure out what
order to list them in when we actually write out the name,
M, we just do it in alphabetical order. M comes before P, so we right
3-methyl before 4-propyl. The entire compound here is
or the entire molecule is 3-methyl-4-propyltridecane And
this is actually all going to be one word. You use dashes to separate when
you have numbers, but if you have a word followed by
a word, it just becomes propyltridecane, so
3-methyl-4-propyltridecane. And we're done. Let's do this one down here. Now this one seems a little
bit more complex. The first thing to see is what
is the largest chain or the largest ring that we have
in our structure? The two candidates, we have
this chain over here. This has one, two, three, four, five, six, seven carbons. Let's see how many carbons
our ring has. Our ring has one, two, three,
four, five, six, seven, eight, nine carbons. So the ring is the largest
core structure in this molecule, so that will be
our core structure. We have nine carbons-- let me
highlight it-- so the ring is this right here. It has nine carbons. The prefix for nine is non-. It's all single bonds, so it's
nonane, and it is in a cycle. It's a ring, so it's
cyclononane. This part right here, that
part right there, is cyclononane. We have several things that
branch off of the cyclononane, so let's look at them one at a
time, and then we'll think about how we're going to number
them on the ring. We looked already at this at
this chain that has seven carbons: one, two, three,
four, five, six, seven. So that is a heptyl group. This over here, let's see
what we're dealing with. We have one, two, three carbons,
so that is just a standard propyl group. Then here, we have one, two,
three, four carbons, so we could say this is
a butyl group. But this isn't just
any butyl group. If we use the common naming,
the carbon we immediately touch on or that we immediately
get to when we go off of our main ring, that
branches off into three other carbons, so this is tert-,
tert- for three. The tert- is usually
written in italics. It's hard to differentiate
that when you see it. I'll write it in cursive. This is tert. This is a tertbutyl group. Now, the next question is how
do we specify where these different groups sit
on this main ring? If you just had one group, you
wouldn't have to specify it, but when you have more than one,
what you actually do is you figure out which one would
be alphabetically first, and that would be number one. Now, we have an H in heptyl, a
P in propyl, and tert-butyl, you might say, well, do I use
the T or do I use the B? And this is just the convention,
you use the B. If you have sec-butyl or
tert-butyl, you ignore the sec- or the tert-. If this was an isobutyl or an
isopropyl, you actually would use the I, so it's a little
bit-- I guess the best way to think about it is there's a dash
here so you can kind of ignore it, but if this was
isobutyl it would all be one word, so you would
consider the I. So in this situation, we would
consider the B, and B comes before P or an H, so that
is where we will start numbering one. Then to figure out which
direction to keep numbering in, we just go in the direction
where we're likely to encounter the first or where
we will encounter the first side chain, so we'll go
in this direction because we get right to the propyl group. One, two, three, four, five,
six, seven, eight, nine. So this compound, we're going
to start with the alphabetically first side chain,
so it's 1-tert-butyl. I'll write this in cursive. 1-tert-butyl. Then the next one
alphabetically is the heptyl group. That's H for heptyl, so
then it is 5-heptyl. And then we have the propyl, and
then it is 2-propyl, and then finally cyclononane,
and we're done!