14 Drawing alkanes
When writing out the alkane structures, you can use different levels of shorthand depending
on the needs at hand in hand. For example, pentane can be written out. Its formula is
C 5 H 12.
Figure 21
,
or CH 3 −CH 2 −CH 2 −CH 2 −CH 3 ,
or CH 3 (CH 2 ) 3 CH 3 ,
or minimized to
Figure 22
14.1 Line drawing shorthand
Although non-cyclic alkanes are called straight-chain alkanes they are technically made of
kinked chains. This is reflected in the line-drawing method. Each ending point and bend in
the line represents one carbon atom and each short line represents one single carbon-carbon
bond. Every carbon is assumed to be surrounded with a maximum number of hydrogen
atoms unless shown otherwise.
Figure 24
Figure 25
Propane, butane, pentane