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An atom bonded to 5 other atoms (and no lone pairs) forms a trigonal bipyramid with two axial and three equatorial positions, but in the seesaw geometry one of the atoms is replaced by a lone pair of electrons, which is always in an equatorial position. This is true because the lone pair occupies more space near the central atom (A) than does a ...
Lone pairs (shown as pairs of dots) in the Lewis structure of hydroxide. In science, a lone pair refers to a pair of valence electrons that are not shared with another atom in a covalent bond [1] and is sometimes called an unshared pair or non-bonding pair. Lone pairs are found in the outermost electron shell of atoms.
A water molecule has two pairs of bonded electrons and two unshared lone pairs. Tetrahedral: Tetra-signifies four, and -hedral relates to a face of a solid, so "tetrahedral" literally means "having four faces". This shape is found when there are four bonds all on one central atom, with no extra unshared electron pairs.
If the ligand atoms were connected, the resulting shape would be that of a pyramid with a square base. The point group symmetry involved is of type C 4v. The geometry is common for certain main group compounds that have a stereochemically-active lone pair, as described by VSEPR theory.
The lone pairs on transition metal atoms are usually stereochemically inactive, meaning that their presence does not change the molecular geometry. For example, the hexaaquo complexes M(H 2 O) 6 are all octahedral for M = V 3+ , Mn 3+ , Co 3+ , Ni 2+ and Zn 2+ , despite the fact that the electronic configurations of the central metal ion are d ...
However, the three hydrogen atoms are repelled by the electron lone pair in a way that the geometry is distorted to a trigonal pyramid (regular 3-sided pyramid) with bond angles of 107°. In contrast, boron trifluoride is flat, adopting a trigonal planar geometry because the boron does not have a lone pair of electrons.
AX 2 E 1 molecules, such as SnCl 2, have only one lone pair and the central angle about 120° (the centre and two vertices of an equilateral triangle). They have three sp 2 orbitals. There exist also sd-hybridised AX 2 compounds of transition metals without lone pairs: they have the central angle about 90° and are also classified as bent.
The linear molecular geometry describes the geometry around a central atom bonded to two other atoms (or ligands) placed at a bond angle of 180°. Linear organic molecules , such as acetylene ( HC≡CH ), are often described by invoking sp orbital hybridization for their carbon centers.