Nomenclatuur van alkanen

The IUPAC names of unbranched alkanes include a stem to signify the length of the carbon chain and the suffix “ane” to identify the compounds as alkanes.

For example, the five-carbon alkane with the stem 'pent' and the suffix 'ane' acquires the name — pentane.

A substituent formed from an alkane is called an alkyl group. For instance, removing one of the terminal hydrogen atoms from pentane gives the pentyl group.

The IUPAC names of branched alkanes have three parts: parent, substituent, and locant. The parent includes a stem and the suffix, and the locant indicates the substituent’s location on the parent.

The parent is identified as the longest continuous chain of carbon atoms. If two or more chains have the same number of carbon atoms, the chain with the greater number of branching points becomes the parent.

Locants are assigned by numbering the carbon atoms of the parent chain.

In the case of a single substituent, numbering begins from the end of the chain that assigns the lower value to the branching point. Thus, the correct name is 3-methylheptane.

A hyphen separates the number and the substituent.

If a molecule has multiple identical substituents, the numbers are assigned su