--%>

Describe characteristics of halides and oxides.

Halides characteristics

(i) These trihalides are mainly covalent with the exception of BiF3 which is ionic.

(ii) The ionic character of trihalides increases in going down the group.

(iii) Like hydrides, these trihalides have pyramidal structure.

(iv) These trihalides except NX3 can be easily hydrolysed by water.

The inability of trihalides of N to hydrolyse is attributed to the non-availability of vacant d-orbitals in nitrogen.

(v) The trihalides of P, As, Sb (especially fluorides and chlorides) act as Lewis acids and combine with Lewis bases

PF3 + F2  1973_halides and oxides.png  PF5

SbF3 + 2F-  1973_halides and oxides.png   [SbF5]
2-

(vi) The pentahalides in general, have less thermal stability as compared to trihalides.

(vii) All the pentahalides act as Lewis acids. It is because the central atom can easily accept the halide ions due to presence of vacant d-orbital and can extend their co-ordination number.

(viii) PCl5 exists as molecule in gaseous state but in solid state it exists as [PCl4]+[PCl6]- and is ionic in nature. PBr5PI5 also exists in the ionic form in solid state.

Reactivity towards oxygen: the elements of this group combine with oxygen directly or indirectly to form a large number of different types of oxides.

Nature of oxides

All the oxides of nitrogen except NO and N2O and phosphorus are strongly acidic: oxides of arsenic are weakly acidic; oxides of antimony are amphoteric and those of bismuth are weakly basic.

Reason: the change in character from acidic to basic can be explained on the basis of the size of atoms. As the size of nitrogen atom is small and it has a strong positive field, it interacts with water more strongly pulling the electron pair between O - H bond and thus release of H+ ions.

However, this tendency diminishes with the increase in size and therefore decreases the acidic character or conversely increases the basic character.

As far as the stability of the oxides is connected it is found that oxides having elements in the higher oxidation state become less stable as we move down to group. This is because of the import pair effect.

   Related Questions in Chemistry

  • Q : Explain Phase Rule The relation between

    The relation between the number of phases, components and the degrees of freedom is known as the phase rule. One constituent systems: the identification of an area on a P-versus-T with one phase of a component system illustrates the two degrees of freedom that

  • Q : Vitamines 7 enzyme cofactor what is the

    what is the relationship between vitamins and enzyme cofactors

  • Q : Rotational energy and entropy due to

    The entropy due to the rotational motion of the molecules of a gas can be calculated. Linear molecules: as was pointed out, any rotating molecule has a set of allowed rotational energies. For a linear molecule the

  • Q : The three facts on the evaporation

    Describe briefly the three facts on the evaporation?

  • Q : Problem on mole fraction of glucose

    Provide solution of this question. While 1.80gm glucose dissolve in 90 of H2O , the mole fraction of glucose is: (a) 0.00399 (b) 0.00199 (c) 0.0199 (d) 0.998

  • Q : Analytical chemistry 37% weight of HCl

    37% weight of HCl and density is 1.1g/ml. find molarity of HCl

  • Q : Explain the molecular mass with respect

    During the formation of polymers, different macromolecules have different degree of polymerisation i.e. they have varied chain lengths. Thus, the molecular masses of the individual macromolecules in a particular sample of the polymer are different. Hence, an average value of the molecular mass is

  • Q : What is solvent dielectric effect?

    Ionic dissociation depends on the dielectric constant of the solvent.The Arrhenius that ions are in aqueous solutions in equilibrium with parent molecular species allows many of the properties of ionic solutions to be understood. But difficulties began to

  • Q : Mole fraction of Carbon dioxide Choose

    Choose the right answer from following. If we take 44g of CO2 and 14g of N2 what will be mole fraction of CO2 in the mixture: (a) 1/5 (b) 1/3 (c) 2/3 (d) 1/4

  • Q : What are diazonium salts? The diazonium

    The diazonium salts are represented by the general formula ArN2 +X where X- ion may be anion such as (Cl) ¨, B ¨r, HSO