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Is There An Ultimate Test Which Could Differentiate An Organic Compund From An Inrganic One?
Is there an ultimate test which could differentiate an organic compund from an inrganic one?
Answers
Good question. To begin with, there's no real rule you can apply to define what organic means. Different people have different opinions on the matter. Substances such as simple carbon oxides, carbonates, carbides and carbonyls etc have historically been regarded as inorganic compounds despite the fact that they contain carbon. Some authorities do...
12:52 Fri 03rd Jun 2016
We remain in the dark about the context of the question you are asking on here and are unaware of your level of study. I'll try to answer your question all the same.
It might be easier if I provided you with a way of detecting organic compounds.
One of the simplest methods is to heat a 25/75 mix of the compound with dry cupric oxide in a horizontally held thick walled test tube and passing the resulting gas via glass tubing into a delivery tube containing a central bulb. The bulb needs to contain a small quantity of anhydrous cupric sulphate. On exit from the tube, the gas is bubbled through lime water in a Buchner flask. The flask arm should be plugged with a tube containing soda-lime.
If the anhydrous cupric sulphate becomes hydrated cupric sulphate (confirmed by the anhydrous cupric sulphate turning blue), the compound contains hydrogen. If the lime-water becomes milky when the gas is bubbled through it, the compound contains carbon (signified by the presence of carbon dioxide).
In suitably equipped laboratories, the principal method of detecting carbon in a compound or unknown substance is instrumental analysis. These are costly, sophisticated instruments that will detect the presence of all elements to a precise level, not only carbon. Variants of Mass Spectrometry and Gas Chromatography would serve the purpose along with Flame Ionisation methods. These instrumental analysis methods will discriminate between organic and inorganic compounds.
I'd like to add though that there are other tests available. By and large, they all depend on form of the substance requiring analysis.
It might be easier if I provided you with a way of detecting organic compounds.
One of the simplest methods is to heat a 25/75 mix of the compound with dry cupric oxide in a horizontally held thick walled test tube and passing the resulting gas via glass tubing into a delivery tube containing a central bulb. The bulb needs to contain a small quantity of anhydrous cupric sulphate. On exit from the tube, the gas is bubbled through lime water in a Buchner flask. The flask arm should be plugged with a tube containing soda-lime.
If the anhydrous cupric sulphate becomes hydrated cupric sulphate (confirmed by the anhydrous cupric sulphate turning blue), the compound contains hydrogen. If the lime-water becomes milky when the gas is bubbled through it, the compound contains carbon (signified by the presence of carbon dioxide).
In suitably equipped laboratories, the principal method of detecting carbon in a compound or unknown substance is instrumental analysis. These are costly, sophisticated instruments that will detect the presence of all elements to a precise level, not only carbon. Variants of Mass Spectrometry and Gas Chromatography would serve the purpose along with Flame Ionisation methods. These instrumental analysis methods will discriminate between organic and inorganic compounds.
I'd like to add though that there are other tests available. By and large, they all depend on form of the substance requiring analysis.
Is there a chance of doing your own home/course work without asking for direct answers on the Internet ? Granted this is a question and answer site but it doesn't do you any good to avoid working through your course and thus not understanding the subject sufficiently that you can answer the questions.
If you are really stuck why not just ask for a pointer in the right direction ?
If you are really stuck why not just ask for a pointer in the right direction ?
Hi guys. First of all a big big thank you to all of you answerers. Guys i just want to say that i am not very smart. My purpose of askin questions is to just have an opinion of what other people think about a particular thing. Just for instance the line of thought that got initiated by my question regardin a simple equilibrium symbol was very interesting. It was as if i was able to view my own qestion in a whole new perspective when i read the thread. As for the comments regarding me dumping my homwrok on you... Guys i am a trained accountant with a job. But i have a pretty bad knack for pure sciences. But since i dont have any formal education, so i read books from the library. I am really sorry if i have upset anyone by asking questions in this platform. I did not know that this was such serious matter. Anyways guys you all have really helped a lot. I know some of you are expecting me to answer some of my seemingly stupid questions. But guys i cant. But i promise if i find any concrete answer to any of my question then i will definitely reply. And from now on i guess its better i stop asking question on this website. Once again thank you all. God bless you. ☺
Sachin114, don't take too much of what has been said to heart. Now that you've explained your position and given us some idea of your level of knowledge on these matters, we're better placed to answer your questions. Scientific questions can be the devil to answer unless you know how much knowledge the poster has to begin with. As a university professor I wouldn't dream of explaining something to a schoolboy in the same way that I'd explain it to one of my lecturers.
Borrowing library books to try to learn about this stuff is admirable. By all means, feel free to ask us anything you don't understand.
Borrowing library books to try to learn about this stuff is admirable. By all means, feel free to ask us anything you don't understand.
Thanks a lot sir. Thank you very much. Sir i read your answer regarding the experiment. Sir what i want to know is that what makes a compound get categorized as an organic one. I did some research. Some say presence of carbon, or c-h bond but others say that there could be exceptions like CCl4 or C2Cl6. And again CO2 even though it has C is not organic. So at a physical level what us the comman property which makes any compund organic. Sir i am sorry if i am confusing you. I dont need a technical answer. For exam if you say that all organic compounds have the tendency of catanation or linkage, then this type of answer would also suffice. Thank you.☺
Good question. To begin with, there's no real rule you can apply to define what organic means. Different people have different opinions on the matter. Substances such as simple carbon oxides, carbonates, carbides and carbonyls etc have historically been regarded as inorganic compounds despite the fact that they contain carbon.
Some authorities do indeed classify compounds as organic on the basis of chemical bonding. As you've discovered, carbon tetrachloride would be excluded on this basis. Nevertheless, most organic compounds do contain C-H bonding.
In general, you can consider that the vast majority of compounds that contain carbon atoms are organic. They are usually combined with hydrogen and often contain other elements.
Some authorities do indeed classify compounds as organic on the basis of chemical bonding. As you've discovered, carbon tetrachloride would be excluded on this basis. Nevertheless, most organic compounds do contain C-H bonding.
In general, you can consider that the vast majority of compounds that contain carbon atoms are organic. They are usually combined with hydrogen and often contain other elements.
No sir. It does not work. I think it is not correct to define organic compounds. The statement that compounds containing carbon bonds and hydro carbons covers pretty much what is needed. Sir what about ammuno cyanate (NH4CNO)... would you consider it as organic on the logic that it has both carbon and hydrogen. Sir i have researched a bit on this. One line of thought that came up was that in amm cynt the CN^- and NH4^+ are having ionic bond. So does this mean that covalency is essential for organic compounds?
@sachin114
I think what had us so puzzled by your question is why the answer mattered at all. I always found the dividing line between organic an inorganic chemistry to be rather arbitrary.
Even a definition like "organic molecules must come from living things" fall down immediately, in the case of carbon tetrachloride and so forth. Astronomers have found vast clouds of methanol and ethanol in interstellar space so we can say those were built by inorganic processes.
I think that, wherever you choose to draw the line, a case will crop up to contradict that placement of it.
In other words, the dividing line is not something to be overly fussed about.
I think what had us so puzzled by your question is why the answer mattered at all. I always found the dividing line between organic an inorganic chemistry to be rather arbitrary.
Even a definition like "organic molecules must come from living things" fall down immediately, in the case of carbon tetrachloride and so forth. Astronomers have found vast clouds of methanol and ethanol in interstellar space so we can say those were built by inorganic processes.
I think that, wherever you choose to draw the line, a case will crop up to contradict that placement of it.
In other words, the dividing line is not something to be overly fussed about.
I think you are right. Its just that we have dedicated a whole seperate branch for studying organic compound. And the frist thing we study while starting organic chem is the meaning of organic compound. And apparently it seems like there are not just some but a lot many compunds about which we cannot decide there status because of the ambiguity of the defi ition . I know it may sound like knit picking, but i think its better to leave the topic...thanks guys...
Sachin114, we were discussing ethyne in my last post and if I've got this right, you seem to think that ethyne does not conform with the quote:
//Organic molecule must contain at least one carbon that has only covalent bonds and is in sp2 hydridization or greater//
The reason that I gave the example of ethyne is that despite not conforming with the rule, ethyne is most definitely organic. Ethyne is the current IUPAC name for the simplest alkyne, Acetylene.
I'd agree that at one time, the quote you cite would have had some validity when discussing organic compounds in general terms. However, the thinking behind it has always been flawed for reasons I could spend all day discussing with you.
Turning back to the quote again, I was curious where you sourced the quote. A quick internet search seems to show that the quote has effectively been cut and pasted from the Naked Scientists forum. I need to point out that this is not the way to go to learn organic chemistry. You are confusing yourself by reading forums rather than confining yourself to fairly academic sources on the web. Believe me, there are many more authoritative guides on the web than those you seem to be looking at so far.
If you can accept constructive criticism, you're trying to run before you can walk when asking your questions. You've done the same earlier today and it seems that the moment you come across a matter you encounter something you can't understand, you post on TheAnswerbank.
I made clear before that we don't mind answering your questions, but you really do need to take a few steps back and read a good foundation organic chemistry textbook to get the very basics of the subject right in your head before advancing as you've not appreciated the fundamentals.
//Organic molecule must contain at least one carbon that has only covalent bonds and is in sp2 hydridization or greater//
The reason that I gave the example of ethyne is that despite not conforming with the rule, ethyne is most definitely organic. Ethyne is the current IUPAC name for the simplest alkyne, Acetylene.
I'd agree that at one time, the quote you cite would have had some validity when discussing organic compounds in general terms. However, the thinking behind it has always been flawed for reasons I could spend all day discussing with you.
Turning back to the quote again, I was curious where you sourced the quote. A quick internet search seems to show that the quote has effectively been cut and pasted from the Naked Scientists forum. I need to point out that this is not the way to go to learn organic chemistry. You are confusing yourself by reading forums rather than confining yourself to fairly academic sources on the web. Believe me, there are many more authoritative guides on the web than those you seem to be looking at so far.
If you can accept constructive criticism, you're trying to run before you can walk when asking your questions. You've done the same earlier today and it seems that the moment you come across a matter you encounter something you can't understand, you post on TheAnswerbank.
I made clear before that we don't mind answering your questions, but you really do need to take a few steps back and read a good foundation organic chemistry textbook to get the very basics of the subject right in your head before advancing as you've not appreciated the fundamentals.
Incidentally, covalency is not essential.
As for ammonium cyanate, it's an inorganic compound unquestionably. I'd refer you to the historical aspects of organic/inorganic chemistry that I mentioned in my earlier post if you want to look into this further. From an empirical formula viewpoint, it has no more right to be considered organic than lithium carbonate or any other carbonate for that matter.
As for ammonium cyanate, it's an inorganic compound unquestionably. I'd refer you to the historical aspects of organic/inorganic chemistry that I mentioned in my earlier post if you want to look into this further. From an empirical formula viewpoint, it has no more right to be considered organic than lithium carbonate or any other carbonate for that matter.
Sir i am reading a book on chemistry. And its actually from there itself that my doubts originate... But i understand your advice about not letting myself wander here and there. Sir i know that there is little credibility of answer posted on internet... but sir what i really want is to study what experts have to say about a particular topic... anyways sir enough about this question... Sir would pls have a look at my other questions pls...
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