What is the Lewis structure of $OCS$ ?

Question

16835 views around the world

You can reuse this answer
Creative Commons License

Answer 1 · 2016-08-04T23:05:12

If you think about it, $"S"$ is right below $"O"$ , so the number of valence electrons it contributes is the same.

Therefore, $"OCS"$ is isoelectronic with $"CO"_2$ , having the same number of valence electrons but not identical atoms.

So, what you have in comparison is:

$color(blue)( :stackrel(..)"O"="C"=stackrel(..)"S": )$ $=>$ $"OCS"$

$:stackrel(..)"O"="C"=stackrel(..)"O":$ $=>$ $"CO"_2$

You can do the electron-counting method and get the same result.

$"O": 6$
$"C": 4$
$"S": 6$

$6+4+6 = 16$ valence electrons

Distribute $8$ of them in two double bonds ( $2$ per bond line), and you have $8$ remaining.

$"O"="C"="S"$

So, $4$ as lone pairs on $"O"$ and $4$ as lone pairs on $"S"$ . This also gives you the above result.

$:stackrel(..)"O"="C"=stackrel(..)"S":$

What is the Lewis structure of OCSOCS?