Talk:Propionaldehyde

Name

Surely this article should be renamed Propanal as the IUPAC name is far more common (no doubt as it is less cumbersome)? Google returns 96 200 hits for "propionaldehyde" and 1 630 000 hits for "propanal". Booshank (talk) 14:47, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

The name issue will be with Wikipedia for a long time - the topic really excites some folks (probably students who want to flex their newly learned nomenclature muscles). 'Propanal' takes one to this page, so there is no crisis. The statistics on the Google search hits is indeed interesting. My proposed explanation is that propanal is a root for more chemical names but propionaldehyde is not a root for as many derivatives. Nonetheless, I have yet to hear a chemist use propenal, but I am sure that it is coming.--Smokefoot (talk) 18:18, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

Well, I am not a student though I will admit to being slightly pendantic. I still believe that propanal is the more common name and have seen it in plenty of papers. Though I prefer the systematic names where they are practical (and propanal is certainly practical compared with propionaldehyde) the concensus is to use the most commonly used name for Wikipedia articles and I believe propanal is commoner. I would not argue for methanal over formaldehyde, though I prefer the former. Not that it should influence the naming, but IUPAC for some reason prefers propanal but when it comes to methanal/formaldehyde it prefers formaldehyde. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Booshank (talk • contribs) 19:06, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

It looks as if a mistake was made, or things have changed drastically! If you Google search on "Propanal" you get 90k hits, but on "Propionaldehyde" you get 98k hits. As Smokefoot points out, propanal is a common subunit of more complex names (more so than is propionaldehyde) so the reality is that propionaldehyde is the more common name. Even more important, propionaldehyde is an acceptable IUPAC name for the parent compound (see IUPAC rules), although substituted derivatives must switch to the "propanal" for the root. Having said all that, if the IUPAC rules change (they are under review at present) I have no objection to the switch being made to propanal. Walkerma (talk) 22:09, 2 December 2010 (UTC)

Really?

I get that formaldehyde and acetaldehyde are common names, but propionaldehyde? That's pushing it. Is it really used in chemistry more than propanal? I don't know about most people, but I couldn't be bothered to type all that in when I could just type in "propanal". I don't think it needs to be changed, but there should be some sort explanation for why propionaldehyde is used instead. --WikiDonn (talk) 03:27, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

Propanal? That's pushing it. Is it ever used in chemistry? I don't know about most people, but I have never heard anyone use the word "propanal" except in that one boring class on nomenclature.--Smokefoot (talk) 05:26, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

I've never heard about 'propionaldehyde' before coming to Wikipedia. Plasmic Physics (talk) 06:14, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

I added quotation marks to distinguish - I knew about the compound, but not about the name. Plasmic Physics (talk) 23:46, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

From my experience in academia and in the chemical industry, I think "propionaldehyde" is more common than "propanal". Google turns up roughly the same amount of results for each term though. I don't think there should be a preference for either title, so it's probably best to leave it where it is. -- Ed (Edgar181) 15:12, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

Tautomerism?

Is Propanal tautomeric to acetone? If you shroop around the methyl group and the one hydrogen then you have it don't you? RaftaReads (talk) 10:18, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

Tautomerism generally involves the relocation of a hydrogen, mostly around double bonds. So acetone is the (much more stable) tautomer of prop-1-en-2-ol, but as for propanal and acetone, they are constitutional isomers, not tautomers. Szaszicska (talk) 14:15, 10 October 2021 (UTC)

To illustrate Szaszicska's explanation, please look at this image. SSG123 (talk) 15:19, 16 October 2021 (UTC)