How many electrons are unpaired in the orbitals of nitrogen?

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How many electrons are unpaired in the orbitals of nitrogen?

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Answer 1 · 2018-04-24T00:21:14

$3$ $3$ Unpaired electrons.

Explanation:

Nitrogen atom has total $7$ $7$ electrons. Two will fill up the $n = 1$ $n=1$ level, and then there are five electrons in the $n = 2$ $n=2$ level.

Nitrogen can bond three times with other electrons to fill up it's shell with 8, (8-5=3). And these are those $3$ $3$ unpaired electrons which were residing the $2 p$ $2p$ sub-shell of the Nitrogen atom , before the formation of $3$ $3$ bonds.

The $2 p_{x}$ $2p_x$ , $2 p_{y}$ $2p_y$ and $2 p_{z}$ $2p_z$ orbitals of the Nitrogen atom have $1$ $1$ unpaired electron in each of them as shown below :-

![https://chem.libretexts.org/Core/Physical_and_Theoretical_Chemistry/Electronic_Structure_of_Atoms_and_Molecules/Electronic_Configurations/Hund's_Rules ]( useruploads.socratic.org )

Thus, the total no. of unpaired electrons in Nitrogen atom is $3$ $3$ .

Hope that helps!

Answer 2 · 2018-04-24T00:23:57

Three (3).

Explanation:

From the Periodic Table or other description of the electron shells of nitrogen we see that its configuration is $1 s^{2} 2 s^{2} 2 p^{3}$ $1s^2 2s^2 2p^3$ .

That means that it has only 3 electrons in the 2p orbitals. Per Hund's Rule, they will not become paired until each available orbital has one electron in it. Thus, nitrogen contains 3 unpaired electrons - one in each of the available p orbitals.

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How many electrons are unpaired in the orbitals of nitrogen?

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