Question

What is catenation? How does carbon form catenated compounds?

Answer 1

Catenation is the binding of an element to itself or with other elements through covalent bonds to form open chain or closed chain compounds. .
Carbon is the most common element which undergoes catenation and forms long chain compounds. Carbon atom links repeatedly to itself through covalent bond to form linear chain, branched chain or ring structure. This property of carbon itself is the reason for the presence of large number of organic carbon compounds. So organic chemistry essentially deals with catenated carbon compounds.

Catenation in carbon