Master the basics of Organic Chemistry

You'll get an brief overview on what organic chemistry is - and why you should fall in love with it! I've included some daily products you use and analysed the ingredients list, let's spot some organic compounds in there.

You should also be able to easily tell what type of covalent bonds in an organic molecule, and thus infer the hybridization of an organic atom (C,N,O,H).

Alkanes are saturated hydrocarbons aka it is 100% single bonded and composed of ONLY hydrogen and carbon.

A molecular formula tells us the chemical composition of the compound, whereas a structural formula gives us the bonding pattern. A compound which has the same molecular formula but different structural formula is known as an isomer.

An example of a pair of isomer is butane and isobutane. An isomer can be made by manipulating its parent chain by

(1) adding substituents from the chain itself

(2) transforming the compound into a cycloalkane (be sure to check with your teacher if this method is acceptable)

In organic chemistry, the term 'name' is coined 'nomenclature'.

Be sure to remember the first 8 nomenclatures for alkanes and this will get you a far in organic chemistry.

Meth, Eth, Prop and But can be remembered as "Monkey Eats Peeled Bananas". You can follow that or simply make your own mnemonics. Get creative!

A conformational isomer or a conformer, arises due to the free rotation about the C-C bond.

A conformer mainly has to projection, sawhorse and newman projection. Both of these are the 'bigger umbrellas', and each of them has 2 ways to represent the projection.

In sawhorse projection, the molecule is viewed from the side.

In newman projection, the molecule is viewed 'face to face'.

In both projections, the molecule can be in an eclipsed or staggered configuration. When it is eclipsed, all the atoms aligns exactly. However when it is staggered, the one of the carbon atom rotates by 60 degrees, and the bond in front is in between the bond behind.

Always remember, conformers are NOT structural isomers. Most of the molecules that exist in nature are able to form isomers, but little forms conformers.

This quiz will test you on your current understanding and serves as a checkpoint to see if you should move on to the next topic, or rewatch the lectures to have a better understanding.

Alkenes are unsaturated hydrocarbons, meaning they have double bonds in a molecule fully composed of carbon and hydrogen. Alkenes has a C=C double bond at any point of the molecule, it does not necessarily be at the end.

A test to distinguish alkenes from alkanes is to add bromine water in the absence of ultraviolet light. Bromine water is essentially bromine dissolved in water. Alkanes have no reaction with bromine in the absence of UV light, thus they turn brown. Imagine adding a drop of brown sauce to a cup of plain water. The plain water will turn brown and the sauce and the water has no reaction.

It's a different case with alkenes. When bromine is added to alkenes, an addition reaction occur to form a colourless compound. As such, it does NOT turn brown.

In all, ALKANE + BROMINE = BROWN

ALKENE + BROMINE = COLOURLESS

Instructions: This quiz will test you on your current understanding and serves as a checkpoint to see if you should move on to the next topic, or rewatch the lectures to have a better understanding.

Carbon can form rings and they're aromatic! Aromatic compounds starts off with benzene which undergoes electrophillic substitution to produce a wide range of compounds used nowadays (eg Phenol, Paracetemol etc).

Benzene has resonance structures as the delocalised pi electrons are able to circulate the ring.

When benzene undergoes reactions, it may have two or more substituent attached to it. For disubstituted benzenes, it is able to form three different isomers namely ortho-, meta- and para and they are relative to the position of the substituents.

This quiz will test you on your current understanding and serves as a checkpoint to see if you should move on to the next topic, or rewatch the lectures to have a better understanding.