Organic Chemistry:A branch of science dealing with the element Carbon and its many properties.

• Most compounds found in living things, other than water, is organic.

  • Organic:Anything containing carbon.

• Carbon helps make 4 major groups of organic macromolecules: Carbohydrates, Lipids, Proteins, and Nucleic Acids.

Important Properties of Carbon for Biology

• Since carbon has 4 valence electrons, it can form 4 covalent bonds.

• This allows carbon to bond with a variety of molecules and fork molecules with an almost infinite variety of shapes and functions.

Carbon atoms are small

• Because carbon is a small atom, its valence electrons are near the nucleus.

• When carbon forms covalent bonds, the bonds are strong; this makes carbon an excellent building material for life.

Organic Molecules

Polymers:Large chains of building blocks found in macromolecules.

Monomers:Individual building blocks of a polymer

• These monomers are linked by covalent bonds.

• Macromolecules are formed by Dehydration Synthesis (also called Condensation) Reactions.

  • Dehydration Synthesis:The process of synthesizing polymers by removing water

  • During these reactions, water is released as a byproduct.

• Macromolecules are broken apart into individual monomers by Hydrolysis reactions.

  • (“lysis” means “to split”)

  • During these reactions, water is used as a reactant.