The hydrocarbons are compounds of carbon and hydrogen. There are two types,
saturated and unsaturated. Saturated hydrocarbons are those in which adjacent car-
bon atoms are joined by a single covalent bond and all other bonds are satis
fi
ed by
hydrogen.
Unsaturated hydrocarbons have at least two carbon atoms that are joined by more
than one covalent bond and all remaining bonds are satis
fi
ed by hydrogen.
Saturated Hydrocarbons
The saturated hydrocarbons form a whole series of compounds starting with one
carbon atom and increasing one carbon atom, stepwise. These compounds are called
alkanes,
or the
methane series.
The principal source is petroleum. Gasoline is a
mixture containing several of them; diesel fuel is another such mixture.
The hydrocarbons serve as feedstocks for the preparation of a wide variety of
organic chemicals. This knowledge serves as the basis of the great petrochemical
industry within the petroleum industry. Saturated hydrocarbons are quite inert to-
ward most chemical reagents. For this reason they were termed
“
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