CHEMISTRY GLOSSARY

congener    →   srodnost

Congener is a term in chemistry that refers to one of many variants or configurations of a common chemical structure. Elements belonging to the same group on the periodic table. For example, sodium and potassium are congeners.

conjugated acid    →   konjugirana kiselina

Conjugated acid is a particle that develops after a base receives a proton.

conjugated base    →   konjugirana baza

Conjugated base is a particle which is left after a molecule of acid releases a proton.

conjugated bond    →   konjugirana veza

Conjugated bonds describe the alternating pattern of double and single bonds, or triple bonds and single bonds, in a molecule. In such molecules, there is some delocalisation of electrons into the pi orbitals of the carbon atoms linked by the single bond.

contaminant    →   kontaminat

Contaminants are any physical, chemical, biological, or radiological substance or matter in water that may be harmful to human health or which degrade the palatability of water.

corticosteroid    →   kortikosteroid

Corticosteroids are general term for hormones produced by the adrenal gland. Includes cortisol and cortisone which regulate the use of nutrients in the body.

carbohydrate    →   ugljikohidrat

Carbohydrates (often called carbs for short) are polyhydroxy aldehydes or ketones, or substances that yield such compounds on hydrolysis. They are also known as saccharides, a term derived from the Latin word saccharum for sugar. Carbohydrates are the most abundant class of compounds in the biological world, making up more than 50 % of the dry weight of the Earth’s biomass. Every type of food we eat can have its energy traced back to a plant. Plants use carbon dioxide and water to make glucose, a simple sugar, in photosynthesis. Other carbohydrates such as cellulose and starch are made from the glucose. Light from the sun is absorbed by chlorophyll and this is converted to the energy necessary to biosynthesize carbohydrates

The term carbohydrate was applied originally to monosaccharides, in recognition of the fact that their empirical composition can be expressed as C_x(H₂O)_y. Later structural studies revealed that these compounds were not hydrates but the term carbohydrate persists.

Carbohydrates are generally classed as either simple or complex. Simple sugars, or monosaccharides, are carbohydrates that can’t be converted into smaller subunits by hydrolysis. Complex carbohydrates are made of two (disaccharides) or more (oligosaccharides, polysaccharides) simple sugars linked together by acetal (glycosidic) bonds and can be split into the former by hydrolysis.

carboxylic acids    →   karboksilne kiseline

Carboxylic acids are organic compounds characterized by the presence of one or more RC(=O)OH groups (the carboxyl group). In the systematic chemical nomenclature carboxylic acids names end in the suffix -oic (e.g. ethanoic acids, CH₃COOH). The carbon of the terminal group being counted as part of the chain. They are generally weak acids. Carboxylic acids include a large and important class of fatty acids and may be either saturated or unsaturated. There are also some natural aromatic carboxylic acids (benzoic, salicylic).

cosmic rays    →   kozmičke zrake

Cosmic rays are high energy (10¹⁵ eV- 10¹⁷ eV) nuclear particles, electrons, and photons, originating mostly outside the solar system, which continually bombard the Earth’s atmosphere.

coulometry    →   kulometrija

Coulometry is a quantitative electrochemical analytical method which is based on measuring the quantity of electricity that has passed and on Faraday’s laws.