one hand about NUMBER_TOKEN degrees without breaking contact and if my fingers were a single bond and my hand atoms weren't held back by my arms I could rotate at a full NUMBER_TOKEN degrees this is known as free rotation when atoms can completely rotate around the axis of a bond the carbons on an ethane molecule can do this so ethane doesn't have any geometric isomers however if I touch two finger tips from each hand I can't rotate one hand without breaking a connection so a double bond between atoms doesn't have free rotation and molecules with double bonds can have geometric isomers that are spatially different take for example the simple alkane pen tween in one geometric isomer the ethyl group and the methyl group are on the same side of the double bond which we use the prefix sis to describe but in the other these groups are opposite each other which we use the prefix trans to describe for more complex alkenes and to stick with our trusty ie PEC rules we use the prefixes E and Z but don't worry about that for now we'll learn about E&Z nomenclature in another episode all this to say electron orbitals and atomic bonds determine the shape of molecules which determines what they can do which determines basically every chemical reaction that keeps us and our universe going even though it can be a little brain bendy to imagine tiny molecules in NUMBER_TOKENd like you would a fluffy cat without them we wouldn't exist to pet cats or watch youtube videos or take organic chemistry tests in this episode we learned that orbital hybridization and valence bond Theory can help us explain NUMBER_TOKENd molecular structures constitutional isomers have the same atoms but different atom to atom connections and geometric isomers have different spatial arrangements next time we'll learn some techniques to understand isomers and atom connections even better thanks for watching this episode of crash course organic chemistry if you want to help keep all crash course free for everybody forever you can join our community on patreon
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