Talk:Functional group

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We want Wiki-the encyclo. to solve the basic problems and try to understand the questions not only in words of chemistry but in the combination of other languages too. for instance english. And the difficulties of students of lower grade should also be solved. That would be really nice of this site. Lots of thanks —Preceding unsigned comment added by 59.95.197.203 (talk) 19:13, 8 December 2007 (UTC) please give me the answer in simple words — Preceding unsigned comment added by 182.188.178.254 (talk) 07:20, 24 February 2014 (UTC)Reply

I would rather say moiety is what is marked as R in all formulas. See IUPAC definition at http://goldbook.iupac.org/M03968.html English is not my native tongue and at the moment I am struggling with the problem of how to name R groups, so I am not a definitive source ;) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Borek (talk • contribs) 10:28, 26 March 2008 (UTC)Reply

'R' comes from "radical", although bound R's in organic molecules are not radicals in the modern sense. The word "moiety" as itself means "a half", "a section", so it appears that IUPAC thinks that small parts should not be "moieties" since they're not halves or significant sections of the molecule. In IUPAC's example, notice that the "alcohol moiety" is not R, but RO. IUPAC's example is rather unusual since an ester does not have an alcohol functional group; it does have a "formal alkoxide" (and acyl) if you want to stretch the definition. Nevertheless, an alcohol functional group should be "-OH". IUPAC's definition appears to express that although "RO-" is not an alcohol, if we synthesized an ester from an alcohol and an acyl anion equivalent, then the "RO-" half or moiety would come from the alcohol. As such, the term "moiety" is not synonymous with "functional group". --Vuo (talk) 22:24, 28 March 2008 (UTC)Reply

They may not be synonymous, but the explanation in the article leaves something to be desired.

"The word moiety (pronounced /ˈmɔɪəti/) is often used synonymously to "functional group," but, according to the IUPAC definition,[3] a moiety is a part of a molecule that may include functional groups as substructures. For example, an ester is a functional group composed of an alcohol moiety and an acyl moiety."

This suggests the difference is that a moiety may include functional groups as substructures... but the example is of a functional group which includes moieties as substructures. There isn't a proper distinction here, and the matter is confused further by the fact that Moiety (chemistry) redirects here. I'm not competent enough to want to edit anything, here, but I think someone should.

-- Student Anselmus (talk) 01:21, 13 August 2011 (UTC)Reply

From "Oxford English Dictionary" re "moiety":

c. Chem. and Biochem. A group of atoms forming a distinct part of a large molecule.

1935 W. A. N. Dorland & E. C. L. Miller Med. Dict. (ed. 17) 842/1 Carbohydrate moiety, the non-nitrogenous residue of the amino acids resulting from deamination.

1945 Jrnl. Biol. Chem. 159 311 The lactone moiety [of pantothenic acid] can replace pantothenic acid for growth of the above organisms.

1954 A. White et al. Princ. Biochem. xii. 265 The other penicillins have the same type of structure but have different side chains replacing the benzyl (C6H5CH2—) moiety.

1974 Nature 13 Dec. 586/2 Its molecular structure (containing both an indole and a phenylethylamine moiety) suggests the possibility of an interaction with brain monoamines.

1993 Dyes & Pigments 21 16 The electron absorption spectra presented are due to the cationic moieties.

O.E.D. re "functional group":

functional group n. Organic Chem. an atom or group of atoms which has a characteristic effect on the physical or chemical properties of the molecule to which it belongs.

1906 Chem. News 28 Sept. 159/2 The authors find that the relations between functional groups in the same molecule are not a periodic function of the position of these functional groups.

1933 Jrnl. Amer. Chem. Soc. 55 3913 When there is only one functional group, the fundamental chain will be selected so as to contain this group.

1957 G. I. Brown Introd. Org. Chem. i. 17 In a compound containing two or more functional groups, e.g. glycine.., which contains an –NH2 and a –COOH group, one of the groups may affect the properties of the other.

1983 R. O. C. Norman & D. J. Waddington Mod. Org. Chem. (ed. 4) xv. 235 Functional group isomerism, exhibited by isomers which have the same molecular formula but contain different functional groups.

-lifeform (talk) 21:40, 29 May 2014 (UTC)Reply

Shouldn't we include oximes and hydrazones next to imines? --Kupirijo (talk) 23:14, 17 April 2008 (UTC)Reply

I agree, those are missing. 83.13.239.255 (talk) 16:27, 25 January 2016 (UTC)Reply

Is it just me or is the Acyl Chloride (R-COCl) group missing? Shouldn't it be in the "groups containing oxygen" category?

Megapanphilos (talk) 18:50, 17 May 2008 (UTC)Reply

I read it and thoroughly enjoyed it (how often can you say that about entries on chemistry?), and would submit that this article is of higher quality than just "start". —Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.243.137.56 (talk) 20:19, 16 April 2009 (UTC)Reply

Upgraded to C-class! -- Beland (talk) 21:12, 31 August 2019 (UTC)Reply

Sulfonic ester: Sulfonate

Notability: Wikipedia:Notability

The reason I make this request arises when I read the articles on Chondroitin sulfate and Heparin, and I try to find the names of the functional groups. For that matter, I would also appreciate if anyone could give the name of NH-SO3 functional group.

On a different note, it seems that there is a need for ranking and filtering by the "notability" of functional groups, so that grade school students can see an abridged list, while other mature readers can see a much longer list, and with more details.

75.142.97.184 (talk) 05:15, 24 November 2013 (UTC)Reply

Well there is no standalone article yet, and only a short paragraph. We have fairly poor coverage of groups of chemicals or functional groups. but I don't see why you cannot have it. Earlier today I was looking for info on the more obscure -N=S=O group which might be called "iminooxosulphurane", but I am not too sure about that. We don't have any yet for silicon, arsenic or selenium. Currently the order is reasonable going from well known to obscure. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 06:29, 24 November 2013 (UTC)Reply

Some Si groups are covered in organosilicon. Off the top of my head I suppose the arsenic ones would be things like arsonic acids with As(V), since the As(III) compounds tend to be substituted things like R₃As (I guess also the arsoles and arsabenzenes). I'd also add tellurium to the list. Double sharp (talk) 03:23, 8 December 2016 (UTC)Reply

The illustration for Methyl ethyl ketone peroxide appears to be wrong. 206.130.136.162 (talk) 05:10, 15 December 2013 (UTC)Reply

I replaced it with tert-Butyl hydroperoxide, as Methyl ethyl ketone peroxide forms a dimer - which would be an example of the next entry. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 00:40, 31 May 2014 (UTC)Reply

Under "Table of common functional groups", at the top of "Groups containing oxygen", should sp/sp2 be sp2/sp3? --lifeform (talk) 07:00, 31 May 2014 (UTC)Reply

Some of the formulas have primes and double primes on Rs that are not reflected in the visual diagrams. Some of the visual diagrams (and matching formulas) use subscripts to indicate the identity of Rs, but subscripts are usually used to indicate quantity (which they are in this article for atoms and confusingly, for some Rs). For clarity, it would be good to convert everything to use primes or superscript numbers instead of subscripts to indicate identity. (Hmm, and other articles might have the same problem.) -- Beland (talk) 21:26, 31 August 2019 (UTC)Reply

Ah, Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style/Chemistry#Nomenclature specifies superscripts on Rs. -- Beland (talk) 21:30, 31 August 2019 (UTC)Reply

Although not normally considered functional it would be good to include a list of common alkyl and aryl groups with names and abbreviations. By common I mean those that are common enough to have an abbreviation that may call for interpretation. In my case it is Bn- (benzyl?) that I am not familiar with. If they shouldn't be included here because they are not classified as functional (in certain respects they will have functions) please include a link to some other article.150.227.15.253 (talk) 09:16, 5 September 2019 (UTC)Reply

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion:

• Sulfonic-acid.svg

Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 12:06, 19 June 2022 (UTC)Reply

Several of the tables in this article are very wide, covering up the right sidebar. Even on the widest monitor I have, the tables in Functional group#Groups containing oxygen, Functional group#Groups containing sulfur and Functional group#Groups containing phosphorus don't fit; of these, the Phosphorus table is widest.

There's lots of good information in these tables, but it may be worth thinking about how they could be rearranged to fit better, especially for readers on devices with medium-sized screens. Would it make sense to break some of the chemical names (e.g., [(alkoxy)hydroxyphosphoryl]oxy-) or formulas (e.g., C(OR)(OR′)(OR″)(OR‴)) onto two lines? Maybe some of the tables can be split into multiple tables, thus reducing the number of columns in each? Perhaps the prefix and suffix columns could be combined? Each of these would make the information presented in the tables a bit less clear, so I'm not sure whether any change would be worth the tradeoff.

I'm not sure what the best solution is. Could be worth thinking about, though. -Jacobdgm (talk) 15:42, 16 May 2026 (UTC)Reply