Dihydroxylated

Part of speech: verb, adjective

Definitions

1. Having been chemically modified by the addition of two hydroxyl groups to a molecule, typically across a double bond
2. Describing a compound that has acquired two hydroxyl (OH) groups through an oxidation or chemical reaction
3. Modified so that a molecule now carries two hydroxyl groups, often as a result of oxidizing an alkene

Etymology: Dihydroxylate is a chemist's coinage built from three pieces: "di-" (two), "hydroxyl" (the OH group, itself made from "hydrogen" and the suffix "-yl" used for chemical radicals), and "-ate," the suffix that turns a substance-name into a verb of chemical change. To dihydroxylate a molecule is to add two hydroxyl groups to it, typically across a carbon-carbon double bond, turning an alkene into a diol. The word belongs to the vocabulary of organic chemistry, which built its names systematically from Greek and Latin elements during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Nobody used it in antiquity, and the pieces were assembled deliberately so that a chemist could read the structure of a reaction straight from its name. The past form "dihydroxylated" describes a molecule that has already undergone this addition of two hydroxyl groups.