why carbon form large number of compounds?

Dear user,

Carbon has some really unique properties which help to form such a large number of compounds....
 

  • Catenation- It is the ability of carbon compounds to form long chains, branched chains or rings.

  • Smaller nucleus helps it to attract more number of electrons.

  • Tetravalency- It has got 4 valence electrons..( actually even silicon, lead and all of group 18 elements are tetra valent but carbon is the one with the above properties as well, which give it an edge over the other elements).

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 There are lots of reasons why there are large number of organic compounds .I’m giving U few of them.
Catenation: The tendency of an element to form chains of identical atoms is called catenation. This tendency is observed in the case of non-metals showing covalency of two or more. However, this property is maximum in carbon as it can combine with other carbon atoms by single, double or triple covalent bonds. The bonding can be extended to form long open chain (straight or branched) or closed ones. Catenation property depends upon the value of bond energy which is maximum in the case of carbon. 
Bond: C-C Si-Si S-S P-P N-N O-O
Bond energy: 83 54 54 50 39 35 (approximately)
(kcal/mol)
The stability or the strength of the bond decreases as the bond energy decreases. Hence, the tendency of catenation decreases in the following manner; C> Si ~ S > P > N > O
Tendency to combine with other non-metals: Carbon has the ability to form strong covalent bonds with many other atoms such as H, O, S, N, Cl, Br, I, etc. The C-C bond energy is approximately equals to the magnitude of bond energies between carbon and various other atoms.
Bond C-C C-H C-O C-Cl C-N C-Br
Bond energy 83.0 97.0 86.0 81.0 73.0 68.0 (approximately)
(kcal/mol)
Isomerism is one of the reason also.

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Carbon forms a large number of compounds because of its peculiar property of CATENATION, it forms a covalent bond so, it can form a large number of compounds, which are known as ORGANIC COMPOUND.

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Due to 

  1. Catenation
  2. Tetravalency
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Carbon forms large no. of compounds due to the property of catenation.

Catenation : Catenation is the property of carbon to form long chains.

Carbon has an electronic configuration 2,6 and thus it completes its valency of 4 by forming covalent bonds in just two shells.So  the compound  has a very small size.Due to this the nucleus holds the electrons of carbon strongly.So if carbon bonds with other atoms it holds the electrons of other atoms also very strongly forming strong bonds.This makes the bond stable and difficult to break.So,since these bonds are very strong they are  difficult to break they form large no. of compounds by bonding with another atoms...

There could be small chains as well as long chains of carbon compounds.But the property of catenation actually allows carbon to form very long chains..

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due to its unique property called CATENATION

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