Octet Rule | Chemistry - Britannica

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chemical bonding

• In chemical bonding: Contributions of Lewis

  …are expressed by his celebrated octet rule, which states that electron transfer or electron sharing proceeds until an atom has acquired an octet of electrons (i.e., the eight electrons characteristic of the valence shell of a noble gas atom). When complete transfer occurs, the bonding is ionic. When electrons are…

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• In chemical bonding: Lewis formulation of a covalent bond

  Lewis’s octet rule is again applicable and is seen to represent the extreme means of achieving lower energy rather than being a goal in itself.

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exceptions

• In chemical bonding: Hypervalence

  Lewis structures and the octet rule jointly offer a succinct indication of the type of bonding that occurs in molecules and show the pattern of single and multiple bonds between the atoms. There are many compounds, however, that do not conform to the octet rule. The most common exceptions…

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octet

• In octet

  …the rule of eight, or octet rule, and is used to determine the valence, or combining capacity, of several chemical elements.

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organosulfur compounds

• In organosulfur compound: Organic compounds of polyvalent sulfur: sulfoxides and sulfones

  This is more than the octet rule allows, but sulfur is not bound by the octet rule, because it can utilize 3d orbitals in its bonding, as would also be required in compounds such as sulfur hexafluoride (SF6). While there is some theoretical support for the expansion of the sulfur…

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