Title: primitive change
Long Title: IUPAC Gold Book - primitive change
DOI: 10.1351/goldbook.P04845
Status: current

Definition
One of the conceptually simpler molecular changes into which an elementary reaction can be notionally dissected. Such changes include bond rupture, bond formation, internal rotation, change of bond length or bond angle, bond migration, redistribution of charge, etc. The concept of primitive changes is helpful in the detailed verbal description of elementary reactions, but a primitive change does not represent a process that is by itself necessarily observable as a component of an elementary reaction.

Related Terms
- angle: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/A00346
- bond length: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/BT07003
- elementary reaction: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/E02035
- migration: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/M03920

Source
- PAC, 1994, 66, 1077. 'Glossary of terms used in physical organic chemistry (IUPAC Recommendations 1994)' on page 1152 (https://doi.org/10.1351/pac199466051077)

Other Outputs
- html: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/P04845/html
- json: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/P04845/json
- xml: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/P04845/xml

Citation: Citation: 'primitive change' in IUPAC Compendium of Chemical Terminology, 5th ed. International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry; 2025. Online version 5.0.0, 2025. 10.1351/goldbook.P04845
License: The IUPAC Gold Book is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike CC BY-SA 4.0 International (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/) for individual terms.
Collection: If you are interested in licensing the Gold Book for commercial use, please contact the IUPAC Executive Director at executivedirector@iupac.org .
Disclaimer: The International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) is continuously reviewing and, where needed, updating terms in the Compendium of Chemical Terminology (the IUPAC Gold Book). Users of these terms are encouraged to include the version of a term with its use and to check regularly for updates to term definitions that you are using.
Accessed: 2026-04-25T06:48:44+00:00