Alcohol
Alcohol (Arabic al-kuhul), term applied to members of a group of chemical compounds and, in popular usage, to the specific compound ethyl alcohol, or ethanol. The Arabic word denotes kohl, a fine powder of antimony used as an eye makeup. The word alcohol originally denoted any fine powder; the alchemists of medieval Europe later applied it to essences obtained by distillation , and this led to the current usage. Alcohols are a class of organic compounds containing the hydroxyl group, OH, attached to a carbon atom. Alcohols have one, two, or three hydroxyl groups attached to their molecules and are thus classified as monohydric, dihydric, or trihydric, respectively. Methanol and ethanol are monohydric alcohols. Alcohols are further classified as primary, secondary, or tertiary, according to whether one, two, or three other carbon atoms are bound to the carbon atom to which the hydroxyl group is bound. Alcohols, although analogous to inorganic bases, are neither acid nor alkaline. They a...