why does a single molecule of argon gas only contains 1 argon atom while other gases such as nitrogen contain 2 of their respective atoms?
In: Chemistry
This has nothing to do with them being gases, really.
It’s simply a matter of the chemical properties of the atom. Some atoms want to make connections, and others are perfectly happy alone. It has to do with the number of outer electrons they have: if their outer electrons are “full” they don’t connect to anything, but if any are missing they try to connect with other atoms to complete them.
For a lot of atoms, the easiest thing to connect to is other copies of themselves. And if you were to isolate a lot of that single element, it would have no choice but to bond with itself because it hates being alone that much.
Argon is a noble gas, which is a group of elements that have “full” electron shells and don’t care about connecting to anything else. That’s basically it.
Latest Answers