An element has the following outer electron configuration inits ground state, wh

Question

An element has the following outer electron configuration inits ground state, where n represents the highest occupied energylevel: (n-1)d^10 ns^2 np^4. Which of the elementslisted below could it be? (some considerations given for thisquestion) a) Si              b) S             c) Se             d) Ge             e) none of these. Thanks so much! An element has the following outer electron configuration inits ground state, where n represents the highest occupied energylevel: (n-1)d^10 ns^2 np^4. Which of the elementslisted below could it be? (some considerations given for thisquestion) a) Si              b) S             c) Se             d) Ge             e) none of these. Thanks so much!

Explanation / Answer

The answer is c. But let's write out the electron configuration foreach of them to see it clearly. a) Si has 14 electrons, the highest occupied energy is 3 andits configuration is: Si:1s22s22p63s23p2. This configuration doesn't have d orbital so it is not theanswer. b) S has 16 electrons, the highest occupied energy is 3 andits configuration is: S:1s22s22p63s23p4 This configuration doesn't have d orbital so it is not theanswer. c) Se has 34 electrons and its highest occupied energy is 4so its configuration is: Se:1s22s22p63s23p64s23d104p4 => correct answer! d) Ge has 32 electrons so its configuration will be like Se but the4p orbital will be 4p2 only. For this problem, you can actually eliminate the a and b, sincewhen looking at the periodic table, you will see Si and S is atperiod 2 which does not have d orbital.

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