Summary Pearson (Edexcel) A-Level Chemistry Chemical Reference Data Organic Chemistry Functional Group Hierarchy Overview

(decreasing priority) prefix suffix (as ending) functional group (formulae)




Carboxylic acid carboxy- -oic acid —C(O)OH




Thiocarboxylic (S-)acid sulphanylcarbonyl- -thioic (S-)acid —C(O)SH IUPAC nomenclature starts with the lowest priorities as prefixes and ends with the highest priorities as a suffix.




Sulfonic acid sulfo- (-)sulfonic acid —S(O2)OH




Sulfinic acid sulfino- (-)sulfinic acid —S(O)OH




Acid anhydride
N/A -oic anhydride —C(O)OC(O)—




Ester (R-)oxycarbonyl- -oate —C(O)O—




Acid chloride chlorocarbonyl- -oyl chloride —C(O)Cl




Amide carbamoyl- -amide —C(O)NH2




Imide imido- -imide

, (decreasing priority) prefix suffix (as ending) functional group (formulae)




Amidine amidino- -amidine




Nitrile cyano- -nitrile —CN




Aldehyde formyl- -al —CHO




Thioaldehyde thioformyl- -thial —CHS




Ketone oxo- -one —C(O)—




Thioketone sulphanylidene- -thione —C(S)—




Selone Selanylidene- -selone —C(Se)—




Tellone Tellanylidene- -tellone —C(Te)—




Alcohol hydroxy- -ol —OH