7/25/2019 A Mnemonic Aid for Aldoses

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JOURNAL OF CHEMICAL EDUCATION

A MNEMONIC AID FOR ALDOSES

WILL 8 . DELOACH AND ANN BRANDON

Arkansas tate

eachers

College, Conway, Arkansas

IF

THE D-aldoses (through the hexoses) are built down

from n-glyceric aldehyde, there is formed a pyramid

consisting of one triose, two tetroses, four pentoses, and

eight hexoses. If, in each pair of compounds formed

by adding one carbon atom to the one above it, the

formula of the one with the

OH

group of the new

asymmetric carhon atom on the left is written on the

left and the other on its right, the names of the com-

pounds will be in this order:

Glyceric aldehyde

Threose Erythrose

Lyxope Xylose Arabinose Ribose

Talose Galactose Idose Gulose Mannose Glucose Altrose Allose

The position of each compound in this table is related

in

a

regular manner to the configurations of the

asymmetric carbon atoms. For example, the com-

Presented at the Southeastern Regional Meeting of the

American Chemical Societv. Birrnineham. Alabama. October.

pound at the right end of each row has all of the

OH

groups on the right, and the compound at the left end

has all O groups on the left, except the bottom one.

The following can be used to help remember the order

of the names:

(1)

Write

GATE GA

B

(2)

Write

L X A R L

X A R

(This might be remembered as

LIAR,

with a stroke across the

I

to make it

X .

(3) Write TIM

T

I d l

4 )Add a

G

afte r each of these

G G G

(5) Add two A s at the end

A A

The complete form is then

G A

T 7?

L X A R

T G I G M G A A

If there is difficulty n remembering which A stands

for altrose and which for allose, it might be noted that

when the last letter is reached, that's all (allose).