Can I name part of a variable after a string?

Hello! I'm a new user, so sorry if I'm doing a stupid question, but here is my problem: Instead of having this program:

 CO2_Tc = 304.12;
 H2O_Tc = 647.14;
 Name = input('Input name: ','s');
 switch Name

    case 'CO2'
        T = input('Input temperature: ');
        Tc = CO2_Tc;
        Tr = T/Tc
    case 'H2O'
        T = input('Input temperature: ');
        Tc = H2O_Tc;
        Tr = T/Tc

    otherwise
        disp('Invalid name')
end

Could I have something like:

 CO2_Tc = 304.12;
 H2O_Tc = 647.14;
 Name = input('Input name: ','s');
 T = input('Input temperature: ');
 Tc = (Name)_Tc; %Here, Name would be replaced by the user's input, like CO2 or H2O
 Tr = T/Tc

Is it possible?

Answer 1

[Walter Roberson]

It is possible, but firmly not recommended

http://www.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/answers/304528-tutorial-why-variables-should-not-be-named-dynamically-eval

http://matlab.wikia.com/wiki/FAQ#How_can_I_create_variables_A1.2C_A2.2C....2CA10_in_a_loop.3F

What I would recommend in your case is to have something like

Tc_vals = struct('CO2', CO2_Tc, 'H2O', H2O_Tc);

and then you could use

Tc = Tc_vals.(Name);

[Rafael Reis]

Thank you very much! This helped a lot!!

And is there a way to assign multiple strings to a single variable, like this:

 Tc_vals = struct('H2O' or 'water' , H2O_Tc);

Or can I only do it like this:

 Tc_vals = struct('H2O', H2O_Tc, 'water', H2O_Tc);

[Walter Roberson]

You can use cell2struct to create multiple struct entries in one call without having to list them out.

[Rafael Reis]

Okay, I'll try it, thank you very much!