0.6 Covalent bonding and electron pair sharing  (Page 2/8)

We further assume the structure of the atom as a massive, positively charged nucleus, whose size is much smaller than that of the atom as a whole, surrounded by a vast open space in which negatively charged electrons move. These electrons can be effectively partitioned into a core and a valence shell, and it is only the electrons in the valence shell which are significant to the chemical properties of the atom. The number of valence electrons in each atom is equal to the group number of that element in the Periodic Table.

We will base much of our work on understanding the Periodic Law, which states that the chemical and physical properties of the elements are periodic functions of the atomic number. Finally, we will assume an understanding of Coulomb’s Law, which describes the attractions and repulsions amongst charged particles.

Observation 1: valence and the octet rule

To begin to understand chemical bonding, we will examine the valence of an atom, which is defined as the atom’s most common tendency to form bonds to other atoms. We can figure these out by looking at some common molecular formulae for molecules formed by each atom. We’ll start with the easiest case, the atoms of the noble gases. Since these atoms do not tend to combine with any other atoms, we will assign their valence as 0, meaning that these atoms tend to form 0 bonds. This doesn’t really get us very far.

To find the valence of an atom which does form bonds, let’s pick molecules which contain only a single atom of the type we’re interested in and see how many other atoms it can combine with. Oxygen is a good place to start. For example, a single O atom will combine with two H atoms to form the most common molecule H ₂ O. Only under rare circumstances would we find any other combination of H and O in a neutral molecule. As such, it appears that the valence of an O atom is 2. Next we consider hydrogen, which combines with virtually any other element except the noble gases. Compounds containing hydrogen can contain a huge variety of the number of H atoms. However, molecules with a single H atom most typically contain only a single other atom, for example HF. A single C atom can combine with four H atoms, but a single H atom typically does not combine with more than one other atom. We do not typically see molecules like C ₄ H. A conspicuous feature of molecules containing hydrogen is that there are typically many more hydrogen atoms than other atoms. For example, hydrogen in combination with carbon alone can form CH ₄ , C ₂ H ₆ , C ₈ H ₁₈ , and many others. These observations lead us to conclude that an H atom has a valence of 1, meaning that a single H atom will typically only form 1 bond to another atom. This seems reasonable, since each H atom contains only a single proton and a single electron. This conclusion also is consistent with our conclusion that O atoms have a valence of 2, since the most common hydrogen-oxygen molecule is H ₂ O.

We can use hydrogen’s valence of 1 to find the valence of other atoms. For example, the valence of C must be 4, since one C atom can combine with 4 H atoms, but not 5, and typically not 3. Nitrogen atoms have a valence of 3, to form NH ₃ . Fluorine atoms have a valence of 1, to form HF molecules.