Qu about Fuels...?

Question

What name in general is given to compounds in fuels which have oxygen atoms in their molecules??? Thanks x

I mean fuels used in vehicles such as car engines...

Answer 1

Most biological "fuels" have oxygen in their molecules and these are known as sugars or carbohydrates.

Edit,

They use Ethanol CH3CH2OH as an additive to petroleum in internal combustion engines. They get the ethanol from the fermentation of sugar extracted mostly from corn (and a few other sources).

basically the sugar is broken down by yeast into ethanol by the fermentation process:

C6H12O6 → 2C2H5OH + 2CO2

Answer 2

The above answer is not quite correct - carbohydrates are compounds with a specific ratio of oxygen, carbon and hydrogen (namely, 1:2:1). Many organic compounds can contain oxygen. For example, alcohols (such as ethanol) contain oxygen, as do phenols, aldehydes, ketones, ethers and esters. It depends on the configuration of the oxygen atom in the organic molecule and has significant effects on its chemical properties.

Answer 3

FOR BIOLOGICAL SYSTEMS: Yeah the first answerer is right, it would be sugars or as they are more correctly known is saccharides. These include, glucose, sucrose, fructose, lactose and galactose. Fructose is in sweet fruits and honey, glucose is what many are broken down to in our own bodies and lactose is what you taste when you drink milk, its not so sweet as the rest so infants go on to nicer tasting foods.

Alcohols are not commonly used as fuels in car engines on a basic level petrol is comprised of benzene and hydrocarbons like octane and diesel is comprised of saturated hydrocarbons and aromatics. But these days biofuels can be used that use alcohols like ethanol and this can be encorporated into fiels (e.g. Biodiesel).

I cant think of any other fuels for non-biological systems that have oxygen in their structure as in engines the fuel becomes oxidised and so the exhaust compounds often will have oxygen in.

Hope this helps!
Don ;-)

Answer 4

Alcohols generally have oxygen in them. There are also oxygen-containing hydrocarbons.

Ethanol and Methanol are the most common alcohols used in car engines.

Answer 5

Alcohols.

Answer 6

I would say they are covalent compounds