Question

17. How many non-bonding electrons does phosphorus have?

Answer 1

@Photon336 can you help with this one too?

Answer 2

@JayTheGreat yes, are you familiar with electron configurations?

Answer 3

somewhat, I don't really understand it tbh.

Answer 4

let's first look at where phosphorus is on the periodic table

Answer 5

phosphorus has an atomic number of 15 so it has 15 electrons.

Answer 6

now non bonding electrons, if I remember this correctly it's talking about the electrons that don't participate in bonds.

Answer 7

so take a look at this periodic table

Answer 8

@JayTheGreat A good way to tell how many nonbonding electrons there are is to look at the vertical columns, called groups. groups are organized based on the number of valence electrons they have. so you can see that phosphorus is in the same group as nitrogen,