A chemical compound formed by the addition of hydrogen cyanide to an organic compound, creating a substance containing both cyanide and hydroxyl groups.
From cyano- (blue, cyanide) + hydrate (water-containing compound). The term emerged in 19th-century chemistry as scientists systematized naming compounds containing cyanide groups that also incorporated water molecules.
Cyanhydrates were crucial to early organic chemistry because they showed chemists how cyanide groups could be added to other molecules—basically the birth of modern synthetic chemistry that led to making medicines and plastics.
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