What is an Organic Compound?
Organic compounds also contain carbon, along with other elements essential for the reproduction of living organisms. Carbon is the main factor as it has four electrons that can accommodate eight electrons in an outer shell. As a result, several forms of bonds can be formed with other carbon atoms and elements such as hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen. Hydrocarbons and proteins are strong examples of organic molecules capable of producing long chains and complex structures.
The organic compounds made up of these molecules form the basis for chemical reactions in plant and animal cells – reactions that provide the energy required to find food, to replicate, and for all other life-related processes.
1. Acyclic or Open Chain Compounds:
These compounds are also known as aliphatic compounds, they have branched or straight chains. Following are the examples in this category.
These are cyclic compounds which contain carbon atoms connected to each other in a ring (homocyclic). When atoms other than carbon are also present then it is called as heterocyclic. Examples of this type are as follows:
They exhibit some properties similar to aliphatic compounds.
They are a special type of compounds which contain benzene and other ring related compounds. Similar to alicyclic, they can also have heteroatoms in the ring. Such compounds are called heterocyclic aromatic compounds. Some examples are as follows:
Organic compounds can also be classified on the basis of functional groups into families or homologous series.
The functional group can be defined as an atom or a group of atoms that are joined together in a specific manner which is responsible for the characteristic chemical properties of organic compounds. Examples, in this case, are the hydroxyl group -OH, aldehyde group -CHO and carboxylic acid group -COOH.
A group or a series of organic compounds in which each member contains the same characteristic functional group and differs from each other by a fixed unit form a homologous series and therefore its members are known as homologous. The members of the homologous series can be represented by a general formula and the successive members differ from each other in the molecular formula by a CH2 unit. There are a number of homologous series in organic chemistry such as alkanes, alkenes, alkynes, haloalkanes, alkanols, amines, etc.