The Letter "C" in Chemistry

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Calorimetry - An experimental method used to study the heat of various chemical reactions, physical changes and heat capacities.

Capillary Action - The spontaneous flow of a liquid in a narrow tube.

Carbanion - A compound containing a negatively charged carbon

Carbene - A compound that contains a carbon that has a lone pair of electrons and an empty p – orbital

Carbocation - A species that contains a positively charged carbon

Carbocation Rearrangement - A rearrangement of a carbocation, by way of shifting electrons, that results in a more stable carbocation

Carbohydrate - Often referred to as a sugar, it is a polyhydroxyl ketone or aldehyde. When naturallyoccurring, they have a D configuration.

(alpha) - Carbon - A carbon that is bonded directly to a leaving group or adjacent to a carbonyl carbon.

(beta) - Carbon - A carbon adjacent to an alpha carbon

Carbonyl - A carbon that is double bonded to an oxygen and two other substituents

Carbonyl Addition - Nucleophilic addition to the carbon in a carbonyl group.

Carbonyl Carbon - The carbon double bonded to the oxygen in a carbonyl group

Carbonyl Compound - A compound that contains a carbonyl group

Carbonyl Oxygen - An oxygen double bonded to a carbon in the carbonyl group

Carboxyl Oxygen - The single bonded oxygen in a carboxylic acid or ester

Carboxylic Acid Derivative - A compound that is hydrolyzed to a carboxylic acid

Catabolism - Reactions that living organisms use to break down complex molecules into simple molecules and energy

Catalyst - A substance that increases the rate of a reaction without getting used up in the process. A catalyst does not change the amount of product yielded, just its rate of production

Catalytic Antibody - A compound that facilitates a reaction by forcing the conformation of the substrate in the direction of the transition state

Catalytic Hydrogenation - The addition of hydrogen to a double or triple bond with the aid of a metal catalyst

Cationic Polymerization - Chain - growth polymerization in which the propagation site is a cation and the initiator is an electrophile

Cathode - The reducing electrode in a galvanic cell

Cation - A positively charges ion

Cell Potential - A value that indicates the magnitude of the driving force that pulls electrons from the anode to the cathode in a galvanic cell. This value is calculated by finding the difference in potential between the anode and cathode half reactions.

Chain Growth Polymer - A polymer made by adding monomers to the growing end of the chain

Chain Transfer - A growing polymer chain reacts with a molecule XY in a manner that allows X toterminate the chain, leaving behind Y to initiate a new chain

Chair Conformation - The most stable conformation of cyclohexane that mildy resembles a chair.

Charles' Law - The volume of a given sample of gas at a constant pressure is directly proportional tothe temperature (K).

Chelate - A ligand that is able to make multiple bonds with a metal ion because it contains more than one atom with an available lone pair.

Chemical Equation - A representation of a chemical reaction which, when balanced, indicates the relative number of reactant and product molecules.

Chemical Equilibrium - The point in a reaction which is macroscopically static and microscopically dynamic. The forward and reverse rates of the reaction are equivalent meaning that, although the reaction is still in progress, the concentrations of all reactants and products remain constant as a function of time.

Chemical Formula - A molecular representation in which the elemental symbols are used to indicate the types of atoms present and subscripts are used to indicate the relative number of each type of atom.

Chiral - An optically active molecule that has a non-superimposable mirror image

Chiral Auxiliary - An enantiomerically pure compound that, when attached to a reactant, causes a product with a particular configuration to be formed.

Chirality Center - An sp3 hybridized atom bonded to four different substituents.

Chlor - Alkali Process - A process for producing chlorine and socium hydroxide through electrolysis of a brine in a mercury cell.

Cholesterol - A steroid that is the precursor of all other animals steroids

Chromatography - A separation technique in which the mixture to be separated is dissolved in a solvent and the solvent is passed through a column packed with an absorbent stationary phase

Cine Substitution - A substitution at the carbon adjacent to the carbon that was bonded to the leaving group

s - cis conformation - the conformation in which two double bonds are on the same side of a single bond

cis - fused - Two cyclohexane rings fused together such that if the second ring were considered to betwo substituents of the first ring, one substituent would be in an axial position and the other would be in the equatorial position.

cis - isomer - The isomer with the hydrogen on the same side of the double bond or cyclic structure

Citric Acid Cycle - A series of reactions that converts the acetyl group of acetyl - CoA into two molecules of CO2

Claisen Condensation - A reaction between two molecules of an ester that connects the (alpha) - carbon of one with the carbonyl carbon of the other and eliminates an alkoxide ion

Clemmensen Reduction - A reaction that reduces the carbonyl group of a ketone to a methylene group using Zn(Hg)/HCl

(alpha) - cleavage - Homolytic cleavage of an alpha substituent

Codons - A trio of organic bases in mRNA that specifies the amino acid to be incorporate into aprotein.

Coenzyme - A cofactor that is an organic molecule

Coenzyme A - A thiol used by biological organisms to form thioesters

Coenzyme B(12) - The coenzyme required by enzymes that catalyze certain rearrangement reactions

Cofactor - An organic molecule or a metal ion that certain enzymes need to catalyze a reaction

Colligative Properties - Properties of a solution that effected by the number of solute particles in solution.

Colloid - A suspension of particles in a dispersing medium

Common Intermediate - An intermediate that two compounds have in common.

Common Ion Effect - The shift in an equilibrium position caused by the addition or presence of an ion already present in the equilibrium reaction

Competitive Inhibitor - A compound that inhibits an enzyme by competing with the substrate for binding at the active site

Complete Ionic Equation - An equation that shows all substances that are strong electrolytes as dissociated in solution

Complete Racemization - The formation of a pair of enantiomers in equal amounts

Complex Carbohydrate - A carbohydrate containing two or more sugar molecules linked together

Complex Ion - A charged species containing some number of ligands bonded to a metal ion.

Compound - A substance with constant composition that can be broken down into its elements through various chemical processes.

Concentration Cell - A galvanic cell in which the anode and cathode compartments contain solutions made up of the same solvent and solute components but that differ in concentration.

Concerted Reaction - A reaction in which all of the bond - making and bond - breaking processes occur in one step

Condensation - The process by which vapor phase molecules condense to the liquid phase.

Condensation Polymerization - A type of polymerization reaction in which a small molecules, like water or alcohol, is formed after the addition of a monomer to the polymer chain.

Conduction Band - The molecular orbitals that can be occupied by electrons that are free to move throughout a metal crystal to conduct heat and/or electricity.

Configuration - The 3D structure of a particular atom in a compound. The configuration is designated by R or S.

Conjugate Acid - The species that is formed when a base accepts one proton (H+)

Conjugate Acid - Base Pair - Two species that differ by one hydrogen ion.

Conjugate Addition - 1,4 - addition to an (alpha, beta) - unsaturated carbonyl compound

Conjugate Base - The species that is formed when an acid loses one proton (H+)

Conjugated Double Bonds - Double bonds separated by one single bond

Constitutional Isomer - A structural isomer in which the molecules have identical molecular formulas but differ in the way the atoms are connected.

Coordinate Covalent Bond - A bond resulting from the interactions between a metal ion (Lewis Acid) and ligand (Lewis Base)

Coordination Isomerism - A type of structural isomerism in which the isomers are composed of the same species but a charged particle acting as counterion in one coordination compound is the ligand another.

Coordination Number - A compound containing a complex ion and enough counterions to neutralize the charge

Copolymer - A polymer formed by the polymerization of two or more different monomers

Core Electrons - The electrons in an atom that are not found in the valence shell orbitals.

Corrosion - The process by which the atmosphere oxidizes metals

Coulomb's Law - A law which describes the energy of the interaction between two charged particles

Counter Ions - Anions or cations that balance the charge on a complex ion in a coordination compound

Coupling Reaction - A reaction that joins two CH - containing groups

Covalent Bond - A bond between two atoms in which the electrons are shared. The degree of the sharing will impact the type of covalent bond.

Covalent Catalysis - Catalysis that occurs as a result of a nucleophile forming a covalent bond with one of the reactants. Also called nucleophilic catalysis

Critical Mass - The mass of fissionable material required to create a self - sustaining chain reaction

Critical Point - The end - point of the liquid - vapor line in a phase diagram.

Critical Pressure - The minimum pressure required to cause a substance to liquefy at the critical temperature.

Critical Temperature - The maximum temperature at which a vapor can be liquefied; regardless of the amount of pressure applied.

Crossed Aldol Addition - An aldol addition in which two different carbonyl compounds are used.

Crosslinking - The existence of intermolecular bonds between adjacent polymer chains which result in a stronger material

Crystal Field Model - A model that uses the splitting of d - orbital energy levels to explain the magnetism and colors of coordination complexes.

Crystalline Solid - A solid that has a very regular arrangement of its components.

Crystallites - Areas in a polymer in which the chain is highly ordered

C - Terminal Amino Acid - The terminal acid of a peptide that has an unbonded carboxyl group

Cubic Closest Packed Structure - A solid modeled by the closest packing of spheres with an abcabc arrangement of layers having a face - centered unit cell.

Cumulated Double Bonds - A situation in which a compound contains double bonds that are adjacent to one another

Curtius Rearrangement - The conversion of an acyl chloride to a primary amine using an azide ion

Cycloaddition Reaction - A reaction in which two molecules, containing pi - bonds, react to form a cyclic compound

Cycloalkane - A closed ring structure that contains only single bonds.