Weekend Challenge Question: (General Chemistry/ Inorganic)

Question

abb0t · Answer

Sketch an MO energy diagram for the the M.O (molecular orbitals) of the $valence$ electrons in cyanide, $CN$. Keeping in mind to show the atomic and molecular orbitals of CN (that means x, y, & z orbitals). Make sure to also keep in mind the ordering of the energy states of each orbital. 

Additionally, which of the orbitals have a nodal plane along the $internuclear$ (bond) $axis$?

anonymous · Answer

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Well this is the sigma bonding part of the diagram, what you do is take the electrons from the carbon and from the nitrogen and distribute them amongst the levels of sigma and pi the s electrons go into the sigma bonding and antibonding levels, So carbon has 6 electrons and nitrogen has 7. So we place that on the board. We are going to be pairing them off in the different energy levels the astericks stands for antibonding, so basically what I did was to convert the atomic orbitals into the bonding and nonbonding molecular orbitals.