nonaliane and ghiorsium
I have always liked IUPAC systematic nomenclature-a word, by the way, which I am old-fashioned enough to pronounce ['nəʊmənkleɪtʃə] rather than the popular [nə(ʊ)'meŋklətʃə]-, and I was pleased to discover recently they had extended the Greek-based numeral prefixes for organic compounds. Because authentic Greek prefixes for 300 on would resemble too closely those for 30 on, they chose to forge a new morpheme out of hecta-, giving -cta-. So the alkanes with 200, 300, up to 900 carbons are called dictane, trictane, up to nonactane. That with 201 is hendictane, with 202 dodictane, with 220 icosadictane, that with 931 hentriacontanonactane. They also adopted kilia- for 1000 (more authentic in its ending at least than kilo-) and clipped -lia- from it: C2000H4002 is diliane and C9000H18002 nonaliane.
The avoidance of the Vernerian variants hebdo- and ogdo- in the tens is sensible. C70H142 is heptacontane and C80H162 is octacontane. These things need to be snapped together like Meccano, by people who don't give a hoot for Grassmann1 and Wackernagel. There's no good reason why Latin was used to name nonane rather than *enneane, but the one that really puzzles me is out on its own: 11 is undeca-, despite good Greek in dodeca- 12 and henicosa- 21.
Speaking of the IUPAC and systematic names, they've had those recommendations open for a year now: when are they going to give final names to ununbium and the next few? I've got spaces in my album next to darmstadtium and roentgenium, I've got hinges, now I want those rumoured wixhausium, rikenium, and ghiorsium. For heaven's sake, Ghiorso is getting on in years. Give him his present while he can enjoy it.
1. Goodness, the linguistic Grassmann laid out the foundations of linear algebra decades before its time.
The avoidance of the Vernerian variants hebdo- and ogdo- in the tens is sensible. C70H142 is heptacontane and C80H162 is octacontane. These things need to be snapped together like Meccano, by people who don't give a hoot for Grassmann1 and Wackernagel. There's no good reason why Latin was used to name nonane rather than *enneane, but the one that really puzzles me is out on its own: 11 is undeca-, despite good Greek in dodeca- 12 and henicosa- 21.
Speaking of the IUPAC and systematic names, they've had those recommendations open for a year now: when are they going to give final names to ununbium and the next few? I've got spaces in my album next to darmstadtium and roentgenium, I've got hinges, now I want those rumoured wixhausium, rikenium, and ghiorsium. For heaven's sake, Ghiorso is getting on in years. Give him his present while he can enjoy it.
1. Goodness, the linguistic Grassmann laid out the foundations of linear algebra decades before its time.