Answer to Question #95308 in General Chemistry for Cindy

Question

For example, when naming the molecular formulas, how do I know which elements come first? I was taught CHO, but why in CHSO, the sulfur comes before the oxygen? The Hill method doesn't apply here since S comes after O, so I'm confused.

Answer 1

Molecular compounds are named with the first element first and then the second element by using the stem of the element name plus the suffix -ide. Numerical prefixes are used to specify the number of atoms in a molecule.