Editing Ethylene (section)

==History==
Some geologists and scholars believe that the famous Greek Oracle at [[Delphi]] (the [[Pythia]]) went into her trance-like state as an effect of ethylene rising from ground faults.<ref name=Roach>{{cite magazine |title=Delphic Oracle's Lips May Have Been Loosened by Gas Vapors |first=John |last=Roach |name-list-style=vanc |magazine=[[National Geographic]] |date=2001-08-14 |url=http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2001/08/0814_delphioracle.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20010924070805/http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2001/08/0814_delphioracle.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=September 24, 2001 |access-date=March 8, 2007}}</ref>

Ethylene appears to have been discovered by [[Johann Joachim Becher]], who obtained it by heating [[ethanol]] with sulfuric acid;<ref>{{cite book |first1=Henry Enfield |last1=Roscoe |first2=Carl |last2=Schorlemmer |name-list-style=vanc |title=A treatise on chemistry |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=o7gtAAAAYAAJ |year=1878 |publisher=D. Appleton |page=611 |volume=1}}</ref> he mentioned the gas in his ''Physica Subterranea'' (1669).<ref>{{cite book |first=James Campbell |last=Brown |name-list-style=vanc |title=A History of Chemistry: From the Earliest Times Till the Present Day |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=pEhCyILvi8cC |date=July 2006 |publisher=Kessinger |isbn=978-1-4286-3831-0 |page=225}}</ref> [[Joseph Priestley]] also mentions the gas in his ''Experiments and observations relating to the various branches of natural philosophy: with a continuation of the observations on air'' (1779), where he reports that [[Jan Ingenhousz]] saw ethylene synthesized in the same way by a Mr. Enée in Amsterdam in 1777 and that Ingenhousz subsequently produced the gas himself.<ref>Appendix, §VIII, pp. 474 ff., [https://archive.org/stream/experimentsobser00prie#page/474/mode/2up ''Experiments and observations relating to the various branches of natural philosophy: with a continuation of the observations on air''], Joseph Priestley, London: printed for J. Johnson, 1779, vol. 1.</ref> The properties of ethylene were studied in 1795 by four [[Netherlands|Dutch]] chemists, Johann Rudolph Deimann, Adrien Paets van Troostwyck, Anthoni Lauwerenburgh and Nicolas Bondt, who found that it differed from [[hydrogen]] gas and that it contained both carbon and hydrogen.<ref>{{harvnb|Roscoe|Schorlemmer|1878|p=612}}</ref> This group also discovered that ethylene could be combined with [[chlorine]] to produce the ''Dutch oil'', [[1,2-Dichloroethane|1,2-dichloroethane]]; this discovery gave ethylene the name used for it at that time, ''olefiant gas'' (oil-making gas.)<ref>{{harvnb|Roscoe|Schorlemmer|1878|p=613}}<br/>{{cite book |first=William |last=Gregory | name-list-style = vanc |title=Handbook of organic chemistry |url=https://archive.org/details/handbookorganic00greggoog |year=1857 |publisher=A.S. Barnes & Co. |page=[https://archive.org/details/handbookorganic00greggoog/page/n167 157] |edition=4th American}}</ref> The term olefiant gas is in turn the etymological origin of the modern word "olefin", the class of hydrocarbons in which ethylene is the first member.{{Citation needed|date=January 2021}}

In the mid-19th century, the suffix ''-ene'' (an Ancient Greek root added to the end of female names meaning "daughter of") was widely used to refer to a molecule or part thereof that contained one fewer hydrogen atoms than the molecule being modified. Thus, ''ethylene'' ({{chem|C|2|H|4}}) was the "daughter of [[ethyl group|ethyl]]" ({{chem|C|2|H|5}}). The name ethylene was used in this sense as early as 1852.<ref>{{Cite web |title=ethylene {{!}} Etymology, origin and meaning of ethylene |url=https://www.etymonline.com/word/ethylene |access-date=2022-07-19 |website=etymonline |language=en |archive-date=2022-07-19 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220719133429/https://www.etymonline.com/word/ethylene |url-status=live }}</ref>

In 1866, the [[Germany|German]] chemist [[August Wilhelm von Hofmann]] proposed a system of hydrocarbon nomenclature in which the suffixes -ane, -ene, -ine, -one, and -une were used to denote the hydrocarbons with 0, 2, 4, 6, and 8 fewer hydrogens than their parent [[alkane]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.chem.yale.edu/~chem125/125/history99/5Valence/Nomenclature/Hofmannaeiou.html|title=Hofmann's Proposal for Systematic Nomenclature of the Hydrocarbons| vauthors = Hofmann AW |access-date=2007-01-06|publisher=www.chem.yale.edu|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060903081507/http://www.chem.yale.edu/~chem125/125/history99/5Valence/Nomenclature/Hofmannaeiou.html|archive-date=2006-09-03}}</ref> In this system, ethylene became ''ethene''. Hofmann's system eventually became the basis for the Geneva nomenclature approved by the International Congress of Chemists in 1892, which remains at the core of the [[IUPAC]] nomenclature. However, by that time, the name ethylene was deeply entrenched, and it remains in wide use today, especially in the chemical industry.

Following experimentation by Luckhardt, Crocker, and Carter at the University of Chicago,<ref>{{cite journal | vauthors = Luckhardt A, Carter JB |date=1 December 1923 |title=Ethylene as a gas anesthetic |journal=Current Researches in Anesthesia & Analgesia |volume=2 |issue=6 |pages=221–229 |doi=10.1213/00000539-192312000-00004|s2cid=71058633 }}</ref> ethylene was used as an anesthetic.<ref>{{cite journal | vauthors = Johnstone GA | title = Advantages of Ethylene-Oxygen as a General Anesthetic | journal = California and Western Medicine | volume = 27 | issue = 2 | pages = 216–8 | date = August 1927 | pmid = 18740435 | pmc = 1655579 }}</ref><ref name=UllmannEthylene>{{cite book |first1=Heinz |last1=Zimmermann |first2=Roland |last2=Walz | name-list-style = vanc |chapter=Ethylene |title=Ullmann's Encyclopedia of Industrial Chemistry |publisher=Wiley-VCH |location=Weinheim |year=2008 |doi=10.1002/14356007.a10_045.pub3|isbn=978-3527306732}}</ref> It remained in use through the 1940s, even while chloroform was being phased out. Its pungent odor and its explosive nature limit its use today.<ref>{{cite journal | vauthors = Whalen FX, Bacon DR, Smith HM | title = Inhaled anesthetics: an historical overview | journal = Best Practice & Research. Clinical Anaesthesiology | volume = 19 | issue = 3 | pages = 323–30 | date = September 2005 | pmid = 16013684 | doi = 10.1016/j.bpa.2005.02.001}}</ref>

===Nomenclature===
The 1979 IUPAC nomenclature rules made an exception for retaining the non-systematic name ''ethylene'';<ref>[http://www.acdlabs.com/iupac/nomenclature/79/r79_53.htm#a_3__1 IUPAC nomenclature rule A-3.1 (1979)] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20001010202833/http://www.acdlabs.com/iupac/nomenclature/79/r79_53.htm#a_3__1 |date=2000-10-10 }}. Acdlabs.com. Retrieved on 2016-04-24.</ref> however, this decision was reversed in the 1993 rules,<ref>[http://www.acdlabs.com/iupac/nomenclature/93/r93_684.htm Footnote to IUPAC nomenclature rule R-9.1, table 19(b)] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071219101601/http://www.acdlabs.com/iupac/nomenclature/93/r93_684.htm |date=2007-12-19 }}. Acdlabs.com. Retrieved on 2016-04-24.</ref> and it remains unchanged in the newest 2013 recommendations,<ref>{{cite book |title=Nomenclature of Organic Chemistry: IUPAC Recommendations and Preferred Names 2013 |date=2014 |publisher=[[Royal Society of Chemistry]] |editor1=Favre, Henri A. |editor2=Powell, Warren H. |isbn=9781849733069 |location=Cambridge |oclc=865143943}}</ref> so the IUPAC name is now ''ethene''. In the IUPAC system, the name ''ethylene'' is reserved for the [[divalent]] group -CH<sub>2</sub>CH<sub>2</sub>-. Hence, names like ''ethylene oxide'' and ''ethylene dibromide'' are permitted, but the use of the name ''ethylene'' for the two-carbon alkene is not. Nevertheless, use of the name ''ethylene'' for H<sub>2</sub>C=CH<sub>2</sub> (and propylene for H<sub>2</sub>C=CHCH<sub>3</sub>) is still prevalent among chemists in North America.<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Vollhardt |first1=K. Peter C. |last2=Schore |first2=Neil Eric |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/1007924903 |title=Organic chemistry : structure and function|date=2018 |isbn=978-1-319-07945-1 |edition=8 |location=New York |publisher=Macmillan Learning |pages=470 |oclc=1007924903}}</ref>