L–

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

• In biochemistry, a symbol used as a prefix to indicate the spatial configuration of certain organic compounds with asymmetric carbon atoms. It is used if an organic compound has a configuration about an asymmetric carbon atom analogous to that of L-glyceraldehyde (the arbitrarily chosen standard), in which the hydroxy (OH) functional group is on the left side of the asymmetric carbon atom.