00:01
Let's first draw the lewis structure for the nitrate ion, n -03 minus.
00:08
Nitrogen has five valence electrons.
00:10
Oxygen has six, but there are three of them.
00:14
Plus we have another electron due to the negative charge.
00:17
This gives us a total of 24 valence electrons.
00:22
So if we put nitrogen in the middle and we bond all three of the oxygens to the nitrogen, we would have used up six electrons, two electrons, per bond, so we've got 18 left over.
00:35
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18.
00:46
Now everything has an octet except for nitrogen.
00:50
So what we're going to have to do is have oxygen share one of its lone pairs, just one of the oxygens.
01:00
Now nitrogen has an octet and all the oxygen have an octet.
01:07
Let's now answer the questions.
01:10
What is the bonding pattern of the central nitrogen atom? number of single bonds, double bonds, triple bonds.
01:19
Okay, well, i guess the bonding pattern is two single and one double.
01:31
But truthfully, this double bond resonates between all three of these...