The structure of a carbon double bonded to an oxygen and single bonded to an oxygen bonded to a hydrogen is called a carboxyl functional group, and molecules with them are called carboxylic acids.......
If we have ONE oxygen atom double bonded to the carbon atom, that leaves two bonding locations available on the carbon atom. Let's say we join the other oxygen atom the carbon atom via a single bond. That leaves one bonding location on the central carbon atom and one on the oxygen atom. We can place a hydrogen atom at each location, like this:
O -- H
I
C = O
I
H
Since this structure corresponds to the known structure of formic acid, I assume it's the correct one.
I'll leave the lone pairs of electrons to you to figure out.
I hope that helps. Good luck!
So put C in the middle (generally when you see an atom that has low electronegativity or can make many bonds, it goes in the middle), have one oxygen double bonded to it, have the other oxygen single bonded to it, and put one hydrogen on the last spot on the carbon and put the other hydrogen on the other bond of the oxygen the carbon makes a single bond with.
Here's a visual: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/co…
And you can read about it here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Formic_acid
There's actually another element with the same elements and numbers of them (an isomer) but I'm pretty sure you're talking about this one.
The structure of a carbon double bonded to an oxygen and single bonded to an oxygen bonded to a hydrogen is called a carboxyl functional group, and molecules with them are called carboxylic acids. This is the simplest of them (just adding a hydrogen onto it)
