A reactive center, also called a propagating center, in chemistry is a particular location, usually an atom, within a chemical compound that is the likely center of a reaction in which the chemical is involved. In chain-growth polymer chemistry this is also the point of propagation for a growing chain. The reactive center is commonly radical, anionic, or cationic in nature, but can also take other forms.
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“This is a strange little complacent country, in many ways a U.S.A. in miniature but of course nearer the center of disturbance!”
—Eleanor Roosevelt (1884–1962)