What is meant when we say that alkanes are saturated?
Carbon has four bonds. When all the bonds are occupied with hydrogen atoms(no double or triple bonds), the molecule is said to be saturated.
CH4 is saturataed.
CH3CH3 or C2H6 is saturated. There is a C-C bond with the other three bonds on each carbon occupied by a hydrogen atom.
H2C=CH2 is ethene. This is an alkene and it is unsaturated.
HC(triple bond)CH [I can't draw a triple bond with this keyboard.] This is ethyne. It is unsaturated also, just more unsaturated than ethene. This is an alkyne. Just remember that the ending -ane means saturated, the ending -ene means unsaturated (an alkene) and the ending -yne means unsaturated (an alkyne). This may be more than you ever wanted to know about the stuff but the extra infor is on me. I hope this helps.
When we say that alkanes are saturated, it means that all of the carbon atoms in the molecule are bonded to the maximum number of hydrogen atoms possible. In other words, there are no double or triple bonds between carbon atoms in the molecule.
To determine if an alkane is saturated, you can look at its molecular formula and the arrangement of its atoms. Each carbon atom in an alkane will have four bonds, where all the bonds are occupied by hydrogen atoms. For example, if you look at the molecule CH3CH3 (also known as ethane), each carbon atom is bonded to three hydrogen atoms and one other carbon atom, satisfying the maximum bonding capacity of the carbon atoms. Therefore, ethane is considered a saturated alkane.
On the other hand, if you have a molecule like H2C=CH2 (known as ethene or ethylene), you can see that there is a double bond between the two carbon atoms. This double bond means that each carbon atom is not bonded to the maximum amount of hydrogen atoms possible, and therefore, ethene is considered unsaturated.
To summarize, an alkane is saturated when all the carbon atoms are bonded to the maximum number of hydrogen atoms, and it is unsaturated if it contains double or triple bonds between carbon atoms.