Carbon

Chemistry of living world is the chemistry of carbon, which is called Organic Chemistry. Carbon is a unique element in a sense that it firms unlimited number of compounds which vary widely in their properties and adaptation.Therefore organic compounds are well adapted with the requirement of living processes. Now question arises why only carbon does it, why not other elements.? Carbon is a light element and has atomic number 6. It contains 4e- (electron) in its outermost shell and requires 4 more e-(electron) to complete its outermost shell. For this purpose, it forms 4 covalent bonds with other atoms i.e, It is trivalent in nature (4 valency)