Nonmetal hydrocarbons

Mark A. Barteau is Robert L. Pigford Professor and Chair of the Department of Chemical Engineering at the University of Delaware. He received his B.S. degree from Washington University in 1976 and his M.S. (1977) and Ph.D. (1981) from Stanford University. His research area is chemical engineering with specialized interests in application of surface techniques to reactions on nonmetals, hydrocarbon and oxygenate chemistry on metals and metal oxides, scanning probe microscopies, and catalysis by metal oxides. 

Peroxide salts should not be confused with organic peroxides. Peroxide salts contain a metal and a peroxide radical. Organic peroxides are made up of nonmetal hydrocarbon radicals and the peroxide functional group. Peroxide salts are water-reactive and give off oxygen, evolve heat, and produce a corrosive liquid in contact with water. 

Chlorine Ammonia, acetylene, alcohols, alkanes, benzene, butadiene, carbon disulflde, dibutyl phthalate, ethers, fluorine, glycerol, hydrocarbons, hydrogen, sodium carbide, flnely divided metals, metal acetylides and carbides, nitrogen compounds, nonmetals, nonmetal hydrides, phosphorus compounds, polychlorobi-phenyl, silicones, steel, sulfldes, synthetic rubber, turpentine... 

Nonmetals form covalent molecular hydrides, which consist of discrete molecules. These compounds are volatile and many are Bronstcd acids. Some are gases— for example, ammonia, the hydrogen halides (HF, HC1, HBr, HI), and the lighter hydrocarbons such as methane, ethane, ethene, and ethyne. Liquid molecular hydrides include water and hydrocarbons such as octane and benzene. 

H2, hydrogen, is a colorless, odorless, tasteless, nonpolar, diamagnetic, diatomic gas with the lowest atomic weight and density of any known substance. It has low solubility in water and is very flammable. Hydrogen is prepared by reactions of metals with water, steam or various acids, electrolysis of water, the water gas reaction and thermal cracking of hydrocarbons. It combines with metals and nonmetals to form hydrides. 

Although the electrochemistry of organic compounds is the focus of the next chapter, several carbon molecules are more appropriate to the present discussion of nonmetals. Carbon dioxide (C02, 0=C=0) and carbon monoxide (CO, C = 0 ) are the products of hydrocarbon combustion, and cynanide ion (CN NC", N = C ) is unique with respect to a stable carbon-centered anion. 

One result of Frankland s research was the realization that alkyl groups could be transferred intact from one atom to another. If the recipient atom were a metal, another organometallic formed if the recipient were carbon or a nonmetal, a purely organic compound was the result. In 1855, Wiirtz (293) demonstrated this by reacting alkyl iodides with sodium metal to produce hydrocarbons. Frankland and his students performed a variety of syntheses using organozinc or organo-sodium species (96, 100, 101), Eq, (4) is typical of this work ... 

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