Alcohol
In chemistry, an
alcohol is an organic compound in which the hydroxyl functional group is bound to a carbon atom. In particular, this carbon center should be saturated, having single bonds to three other atoms. An important class of alcohols are the simple acyclic alcohols, the general formula for which is CnH2n+1OH. Of these ethanol is the alcohol found in alcoholic beverages; in common speech the word
alcohol refers to ethanol. Other alcohols are usually described with a clarifying adjective, as in
isopropyl alcohol or
wood alcohol. The suffix
-ol appears in the IUPAC chemical name of all substances where the hydroxyl group is the functional group with the highest priority; in substances where a higher priority group is present the prefix
hydroxy- will appear in the IUPAC name. The suffix
-ol in non-systematic names also typically indicates that the substance includes a hydroxyl functional group and, so, can be termed an alcohol. But many substances, particularly sugars contain hydroxyl functional groups without using the suffix.