Master Organic Chemistry Compounds: 125 Flashcards on Functional Groups, pKa and Reactions
Study the Organic Chemistry: Reactions & Compounds deck (MB0110): functional groups, a pKa ladder, aromaticity, aldol and retrosynthesis, plus 3 cards to fix.
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Deck MB0110 — Organic Chemistry: Reactions & Compounds has 125 cards, but only about a dozen deal with reactions. The rest is a history-and-vocabulary tour of organic chemistry, followed by a solid block on functional groups and pKa. Study it as what it really is: a compound-classification and acidity deck.
Study this deck: Organic Chemistry: Reactions & Compounds
1 / 10Organic chemistry
Tap the card for the answer · swipe right if you knew it, left if not
How the deck is built
- Cards 1-73: taken from an encyclopedia article. They cover history (vitalism, Wöhler, Perkin's mauve, arsphenamine), analysis (NMR, mass spec, crystallography), hydrocarbon families, biomolecules, reaction types and nomenclature (IUPAC, SMILES, InChI, Geneva rules).
- Cards 74-125: a functional-groups block with the six groups found in organisms, a pKa ladder, water solubility and the carbonyl family.
The second block repeats a lot of the first. Alcohol appears 3 times (cards 17, 74, 76), carboxyl 3 times (18, 77, 83) and aspirin twice (6, 112). The pKa values for acids, amines and acyl chloride each appear twice as well. Keep one card per concept, preferably the one that has a formula on the back, and suspend the rest.
Cards worth knowing cold
| Front | Back |
|---|---|
| Aromaticity | 4n + 2 delocalized pi electrons in a cyclic compound |
| Antiaromaticity | Instability from 4n conjugated pi electrons |
| Spiro compounds | One atom has two bonds to one ring and two to another |
| Enolate | A nucleophilic form of a carbonyl compound |
| Aldol reaction | A carbonyl acts as both nucleophile (enolate) and electrophile |
| Retrosynthesis | Start from the target and cut it apart along known reactions |
| Typical pKa of thiols | Around 13 |
| Aldehydes vs ketones | Carbonyl carbon bonded to ≥1 H vs two carbon groups |
Covered in the deck: alkanes, alkenes, alkynes, cyclopropane, benzene, heterocycles (pyridine, furan, piperidine, THF), polycyclic compounds, fullerenes, C60, carbon nanotubes, polymers and monomers, isoprene, terpenes, cholesterol, peptide bonds, the 20 amino acids, nucleophiles, electrophiles, arrow pushing, steric hindrance, reactive intermediates, oseltamivir, ester, ether, amide, nitrile, malonate, halides, organometallics and hydrogen bonding.
Cards to fix before you review
- Card 36 says "starches in animals and celluloses in plants." That is wrong: animals store glycogen, while plants make both starch and cellulose. Rewrite the card.
- Cards 68 and 91 say amines are "very basic (pKa ~35)." The value 35 is the pKa of the amine's own N-H, which measures how acidic the amine is. Amine basicity is measured by the pKa of the ammonium ion, about 10-11. If you learn "35 = basic," you will get exam questions wrong.
- Cards 66 and 98 say acyl chlorides have "the lowest measured pKa." Acyl chlorides have no acidic proton that pKa could measure. Their reactivity comes from the Cl leaving group and the strongly electrophilic C=O. Rewrite the card as: "most reactive carboxylic acid derivative."
Study tips
- Build a single pKa ladder card. Cards 67 and 93-97 are really one sequence: carboxylic acid 4 → thiol 13 (malonate CH₂ is also about 13) → alcohol 17 → aldehyde α-H 20 → nitrile α-H 25 → amine N-H 35. Learn the whole sequence on one card, then drill the reverse direction: "which group has pKa ≈ 17?"
- Write the missing reaction cards. Card 46 lists six reaction types, but only substitution gets an equation. SN1 vs SN2, E1 vs E2 and Markovnikov addition never appear, and those are the core of any organic chemistry exam. Add 5-6 cards on them.
If you already studied the structure deck, about 40 of these cards overlap with it. See How to Learn Organic Chemistry Concepts: 126 Flashcards on Structure, Functional Groups and Synthesis and suspend the duplicates rather than reviewing both decks in parallel.
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