Carboxylates

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A class of compounds formed when a carboxylic acid reacts with an alcohol, resulting in an esterification process
2. These substances commonly serve as intermediates in various organic reactions
3. Functional groups characterized by the presence of a carboxyl group in their molecular structure

Etymology: "Carboxylate" is a plain piece of chemical naming. It is formed from "carboxylic acid" plus the suffix "-ate," so the word describes the salts and esters derived from a carboxylic acid. The "-ate" ending is an old chemical convention, borrowed through Latin "-atus" and "-ātus," a suffix that marks a substance derived from or related to a parent compound, as in "sulphate" or "nitrate." "Carboxylic" itself combines "carbon" with "oxygen" and the Greek-derived "-ic" of acidic compounds, reflecting the carboxyl group (a carbon bonded to both an oxygen and a hydroxyl group) that defines these acids. Because the chemistry of such groups was named in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the word is a modern technical coinage rather than an ancient one. Its pattern is simply systematic: name the parent acid, then add the suffix that signals the derived class.

Synonyms: salts, esters, derivatives, compounds, anions