THE GENESIS OF LONE PAIRS AND THE HIDDEN COUNTER ION CLUSTERS

A wide range of chemical clusters have been analyzed and categorized using skeletal numbers. However, less attention has been given to their applications to 'ordinary compounds' with formulas such as NaCl, CaCl2, AlCl3, CCl4, SF4, PF5, SF6, XeF4, and XeOF4.In this book, skeletal numbers have discovered that some of these formulas actually comprise of a mixture of hidden cluster fragments and ions and especially in xenon clusters. It will be of great interest to find a link between VSEPR (valence shell electron pair repulsion) theory which is normally used to explain some of these formulas and the skeletal numbers. Furthermore, it has been found to be very useful to apply the LONE PAIR concept as well to explain these clusters. For the purposes of comparison, the analysis of ZINTL ion clusters has been included to determine their isomeric shapes, cluster valence electrons and LONE PAIRS. As we move across the period for the main group elements, it appears that lone pair formation begins with group 5 and ends with group 8.