Carboxylic Acids Properties

Carboxylic Acids Preparation and Properties

→ Organic compounds containing a carboxyl functional group are called carboxylic acid. These are carboxylic derivatives of hydrocarbon in which one or more H-atoms are substituted by carboxylic group in a hydrocarbon chain. The general formula of carboxylic acid is C_nH_2nO₂. It can also be written as C_nH_2n+nCOOH or R-COOH.
Carboxylic group is the association of two Carboxylic group groups.

Carbonyl and Alcoholic group (-OH).

→ But this group does not show the properties of carbonyl and alcoholic (hydroxyl) group. Carboxylic group are classified as mono-carboxylic, di-carboxylic and tri carboxylic acid according to number of carboxylic group -COOH) in their structure formula.

→ Carboxylic acid is of two types aliphatic acid (R-COOH), aromatic acid (Ar-COOH). The higher member(C₁₂ – C₁₈) of carboxylic acid are called fatty acids because they occur naturally in higher member of family like palmitic acid (C₁₅H₃₁COOH), oleic acid (C₁₇H₃₃COOH) and stearic acid ( C₁₇H₃₅COOH), oil and fat like triester or triglyceredes with glycerol.

Chemistry Notes