Trans-6-bromo-3-cyano-2-methyl-4-octene

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This is an IUPAC (International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry) name for an organic compound. The first thing to do when reading an IUPAC name is to figure out what the "backbone" of the molecule is. This is done by looking at the far right ending of the name (the last "word"). In this case it is "octene". In the IUPAC standard, this word is broken up into two parts, a prefix ("oct") and a suffix ("ene"). The prefix tells you how many carbon atoms are in the chain that makes up the backbone of the molecule - in this case "oct" means 8. The suffix tells you the main functionality that is present in the molecule - in this case "ene" means that there is a carbon-carbon double bond. The location of ...