[Burningkrome]

Hey,

I'm a returning student and I find a gap in my understanding. I'm not having any luck finding the topic on my own...so any answers or links would be greatly appreciated.

I understand the octet rule...however sulfur and phosphorus often do not always obey the octet rule. My understanding is this has to do with their open D subshells...but what exactly? Why can these (and others I presume) have such a large variety of bond numbers?

Thanks~!

[AWK]

I understand the octet rule...however sulfur and phosphorus often do not always obey the octet rule.

The octet rule is devoted for the second row elements (from Li to Ne). All the other elements are exclussions. Sometimes it can be used for simple compounds of elements of higher s and p blocks in easy way.

[Babcock_Hall]

There was a study by Reed and Weinhold in 1986 that agreed that the d orbitals were important but disputed the notion of sp3d2 hybridization on SF6:  http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/ja00273a006  I have not followed the field closely, but perhaps others have.