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Dicyanoacetylene

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Dicyanoacetylene

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Dicyanoacetylene, also called carbon subnitride or but-2-ynedinitrile (IUPAC), is a compound of carbon and nitrogen with chemical formula . At room temperature, dicyanoacetylene is a colorless volatile liquid. It has a linear molecular structure, (often abbreviated as ), with alternating triple and single covalent bonds. It can be viewed as acetylene with the two hydrogen atoms replaced by cyanide groups.

Chemical data

Formula
C4N2
Molecular weight
76.06 g/mol
IUPAC name
but-2-ynedinitrile
SMILES
C(#CC#N)C#N
InChIKey
ZEHZNAXXOOYTJM-UHFFFAOYSA-N
XLogP
0.5
Polar surface area
47.6 Ų
H-bond donors
0
H-bond acceptors
2
Formal charge
0

via PubChem

~2 min read

Encyclopedic overview

5 sections
Contents
  • Synthesis
  • As a reagent in organic chemistry
  • In outer space
  • See also
  • References

Dicyanoacetylene, also called carbon subnitride or but-2-ynedinitrile (IUPAC), is a compound of carbon and nitrogen with chemical formula . At room temperature, dicyanoacetylene is a colorless volatile liquid. It has a linear molecular structure, (often abbreviated as ), with alternating triple and single covalent bonds. It can be viewed as acetylene with the two hydrogen atoms replaced by cyanide groups.

Because of its high endothermic heat of formation, dicyanoacetylene can explode to carbon powder and nitrogen gas, and it burns in oxygen with a bright blue-white flame at a temperature of , the hottest flame in oxygen; burned in ozone at high pressure the flame temperature exceeds . Dicyanoacetylene polymerizes at room temperature into a dark solid.

Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Dicyanoacetylene” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.