Dicarboxylate

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A salt or ester formed from a dicarboxylic acid, an organic compound containing two carboxyl groups
2. The anion or ester derived from an acid that has two carboxylic acid groups in its molecule
3. A chemical compound produced when both acidic groups of a dicarboxylic acid are neutralized or esterified

Etymology: "Dicarboxylate" is a chemistry term built from three parts: the Greek prefix "di-" meaning "two," the word "carboxyl," and the suffix "-ate," which chemists use for the salts and esters of acids. The "carboxyl" part is itself a coinage of the late 19th century, made by combining "carbon" with "oxygen" and "hydroxyl," and it names the group of atoms (a carbon double-bonded to an oxygen, with a hydroxyl attached) that gives carboxylic acids their acidic behaviour. Chemists used "-ate" for salts of acids since the early 1800s, when the systematic naming of compounds took shape in France, so the suffix predates the carboxyl group by several decades. Putting the parts together gives a precise description: a dicarboxylate is the negatively charged ion, or the ester, produced when a molecule carrying two carboxyl groups loses its acidic hydrogens. Succinic acid, which has two such groups, gives succinate salts and esters, and the same pattern holds for many other dicarboxylic acids. The term is therefore a straightforward systematic name, assembled from its components rather than inherited from older everyday language.