How molecular orbitals change as atomic energy levels shift
Web Resources and Apps
Submitted by William F Coleman, Wellesley CollegeOver the years I have developed a number of interactive tools that I use in my classes. This is a tool that seems appropriate for VIPEr. Comments are always appreciated, and I am always interested in developing new tools if there is something you might find useful.
This tool allows you to look at how molecular orbitals change as the difference in electronegativities of the parent atomic orbitals increases.
NOTE ADDED OCT 2014: As Flick's site at Wellesley is not available anymore I looked in his archive website (http://www.flicksstuff.com) and found the final version of this web resource, and it is linked below. I have left the rest of the LO unchanged for archival purposes. --Adam Johnson, Harvey Mudd College
Comments
can't wait to try it in class!
Effect on orbital shapes
This does look great! And just in time to use in class tomorrow.
I think a great addition would be to couple this with images showing how the molecular orbital probability distributions change as one particular atomic orbital begins to dominate in the molecular orbital.
Response to Maggie's Suggestion
Maggie,
Take a look at and see if this is of interest. http://www.wellesley.edu/Chemistry/Flick/chem341/mocovtoionic1.html. After reading your suggestion I tried to think of a reasonably honest way of showing it, and this seems to work. The black circles represent the nuclei and the percent of A and B range from 50:50 to 99.5%B 0.5% A.
Cheers,
Flick
A must use.
That's about two orders of magnitude better than the crappy drawings I've been putting up on the whiteboard all these years.... The addition of the sigma orbitals is fantastic (a corresponding sigma* would also be cool)!
Including bonding and antibonding sigma orbitals
I had the same thought as Scott earlier this evening and the latest version, with sigma bonding and antibonding orbitals is at http://www.wellesley.edu/Chemistry/Flick/chem341/mocovtoionic2.html
Cheers,
Flick
Thanks!!
A similar tool.....
My "energy levels" tool attempts to do something similar:
http://firstyear.chem.usyd.edu.au/calculators/mo_diagrams.shtml
Click on the "energy levels" link.
It also calculates the Mulliken charges and Wiberg bond order and I use this to show the balance between ionic and covalent contributions to the bond.
cool
Adam
This is great.
I am sad to see that the link
I am sad to see that the link is no longer live. I know that Flick was going to try to archive it somewhere somehow after he retired. We will update this for sure!
I found it! http://www
I found it! http://www.flicksstuff.com/wfcmaterials/mocovtoionic2.html
I'll put this up in the original LO too
Oh thank goodness. I need
Oh thank goodness. I need this for next week's class, just tried the link, and I think I screamed just a little when the link broke. Thanks much, Adam, for tracking down the archive. Phew!