ABSTRACT
The immense number of carbon-sulfur compounds in use today, both in medicine and agriculture, means that any review of the area can be best served only by the use of examples to highlight the general trends that exist in the various groups that comprise the collection of compounds that are classified as carbon-sulfur compounds. These include the dithioic acids, thioamides, thioethers (or sulfides), thioketones, thiocarbamides, thiocarbamates (which includes the carbamothioates), dithiocarbamates (or carbamodithioates) and sulfur heterocycles. The sulfur atom, which has the ability to expand electronically into the d-orbitals, exists in a number of varying oxidation states ranging from –2 to +6 (Mitchell and Nickson 1993). The carbon-sulfur groups of compounds all exist in the –2 oxidation state. To enable the reader to come to terms with this vast group of compounds this chapter has been divided into sections-iones, sulfur heterocycles and thioethers-and then further subdivided into the various classes of compounds again. Each class of compound is reviewed in terms of its applications, metabolism and toxicity.
