Distinguish between organic and inorganic molecules?

Question

Emma Arvizu · Accepted Answer

See the explanation below.

Organic molecules are molecules that contain carbon-hydrogen bonds. Almost all organic molecules are hydrocarbons. They are called organic because they are essential for life to exist.

Some examples of organic molecules include:

Methane #(CH_4)#

Glucose #(C_6H_12O_6)#

Ethanol #(C_2H_5OH)# or #(C_2H_6O)#

Here is a picture of some more:

As you can see here, all of them contain carbon and hydrogen in their chemical structure.

I think you can guess then what are inorganic molecules. Well, they are molecules without carbon-hydrogen bonds. While they still can contain carbon compounds, such as #(CO_2)#, or hydrogen compounds, such as #(H_2O)#, they are not allowed to have carbon-hydrogen bonds, so molecules like #(C_2H_6)# are not considered inorganic.

However, some are still essential for life, such as

Water #(H_2O)#

Oxygen gas #(O_2)#

But mainly, some can be quite common compounds, with examples like

Rust #(Fe_2O_3*nH_2O)#

Table salt #(NaCl)#

Hydrochloric acid #(HCl)#

Here are pictures of the compounds I've mentioned above:

Luna Cruz · Answer

undefined Inorganic molecules are made up of simpler compounds like salts, metals, and minerals, while organic molecules, which frequently make up the structure of biological molecules, are made up of carbon atoms bound to hydrogen atoms.