Related topics: alcohol consumption , drinking , alcohol abuse , genes , brain
Alcohol
hideIn chemistry, an alcohol is any organic compound in which a hydroxyl group (-OH) is bound to a carbon atom of an alkyl or substituted alkyl group. The general formula for a simple acyclic alcohol is CnH2n+1OH. In common terms, the word alcohol refers to ethanol, the type of alcohol found in alcoholic beverages.
Ethanol is a colorless, volatile liquid with a mild odor which can be obtained by the fermentation of sugars. (Industrially, it is more commonly obtained by ethylene hydration—the reaction of ethylene with water in the presence of phosphoric acid.) Ethanol is the most widely used depressant in the world, and has been for thousands of years. This sense underlies the term alcoholism (addiction to alcohol).
Other alcohols are usually described with a clarifying adjective, as in isopropyl alcohol (propan-2-ol) or wood alcohol (methyl alcohol, or methanol). The suffix -ol appears in the IUPAC chemical name of all alcohols.[citation needed]
There are three major subsets of alcohols: primary (1°), secondary (2°) and tertiary (3°), based upon the number of carbon atoms the C-OH group's carbon (shown in red) is bonded to. Ethanol is a simple 'primary' alcohol. The simplest secondary alcohol is isopropyl alcohol (propan-2-ol), and a simple tertiary alcohol is tert-butyl alcohol (2-methylpropan-2-ol).
For more information about Alcohol, read the full article at
Wikipedia.
This text uses material from Wikipedia and is available under the GNU Free Documentation License.
News tagged with alcohol
Developing Brains: Alcohol Worse than Marijuana
Mar 26, 2009 |
4.9 / 5 (34) |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- It appears that when it comes to teen brain development, parents should be more worried about alcohol abuse than marijuana abuse. Two recent studies have been published showing that alcohol ...
'Beneficial' effects of alcohol?
Oct 14, 2009 |
4.7 / 5 (15) |
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According a new study of over 3,000 adults aged 70-79, the apparent association between light-to-moderate alcohol consumption and reduced risk of functional decline over time did not hold up after adjustments ...
Longer life linked to specific foods in Mediterranean diet
Jun 23, 2009 |
4.1 / 5 (16) |
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Some food groups in the Mediterranean diet are more important than others in promoting health and longer life according to new research published on bmj.com today.
Site for alcohol's action in the brain discovered
Medicine & Health / Neuroscience
Jun 28, 2009 |
5 / 5 (10) |
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Alcohol's inebriating effects are familiar to everyone. But the molecular details of alcohol's impact on brain activity remain a mystery. A new study by researchers at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies ...
Is cannabis the answer to Booze Britain's problems?
Dec 01, 2009 |
4.9 / 5 (7) |
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Substituting cannabis in place of more harmful drugs may be a winning strategy in the fight against substance misuse. Research published in BioMed Central' open access Harm Reduction Journal features a poll of 350 cannab ...
Alcohol helps lower heart disease risk for men: study
Nov 19, 2009 |
4.3 / 5 (7) |
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Men who drink alcohol every day see a nearly one-third average reduction in the risk of coronary heart disease, according to a long-term study among Spanish men published on Thursday.
Even low alcohol consumption has a negative impact on overall health
Oct 23, 2009 |
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Low alcohol consumption is bad for your health in general. Researchers writing in BioMed Central's open access journal Cost Effectiveness and Resource Allocation studied the relationship between alcohol consumption and he ...
Brain activity predicts people's choices
Medicine & Health / Neuroscience
Mar 24, 2009 |
5 / 5 (5) |
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The activity in one brain structure can predict people's preferences, according to new research in the March 25 issue of The Journal of Neuroscience. The study shows that even when people rate options similarly, they will c ...
Half a glass of wine a day may boost life expectancy by five years
Apr 30, 2009 |
5 / 5 (5) |
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Drinking up to half a glass of wine a day may boost life expectancy by five years—at least in men—suggests research published ahead of print in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health.
Regular moderate alcohol intake has cognitive benefits in older adults
Jul 13, 2009 |
3.1 / 5 (7) |
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A glass of wine here, a nightcap there - new research out of Wake Forest University School of Medicine suggests that moderate alcohol intake offers long-term cognitive protection and reduces the risk of dementia ...
The brain maintains language skills in spite of alcohol damage by drawing from other regions
Mar 20, 2009 |
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Researchers know that alcoholism can damage the brain's frontal lobes and cerebellum, regions involved in language processing. Nonetheless, alcoholics' language skills appear to be relatively spared from alcohol's damaging ...
Study shows 1 in 25 deaths worldwide attributable to alcohol
Jun 26, 2009 |
5 / 5 (4) |
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Research from Canada's own Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) featured in this week's edition of the Lancet shows that worldwide, 1 in 25 deaths are directly attributable to alcohol consumption. This rise since ...
'Happy hour' gene discovery suggests cancer drugs might treat alcoholism
May 21, 2009 |
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A class of drugs already approved as cancer treatments might also help to beat alcohol addiction. That's the conclusion of a discovery in flies of a gene, dubbed happyhour, that has an important and previously unknown role ...
New ways to predict violent behavior?
Medicine & Health / Psychology & Psychiatry
Sep 25, 2009 |
4.8 / 5 (4) |
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In the future, diagnosing severe personality disorders, evaluating the childhood environment, assessing alcohol consumption and the analysis of the MAOA genotype may provide more accurate means for assessing risk among violent ...
Drinkers not only zone out -- but also are unaware that they do
Medicine & Health / Psychology & Psychiatry
May 05, 2009 |
3.2 / 5 (5) |
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A new study out of the University of Pittsburgh suggests that a moderate dose of alcohol increases a person's mind wandering, while at the same time reducing the likelihood of noticing that one's mind has wandered.
