Question

What is a polyatomic ion?

A polyatomic ion is an ion composed of more than one kind of atom. For example, the hydrogen carbonate ion, HCO3^- (also called bicarbonate), ammonium ion (NH4^+), oxalate ion (C2O4^-2), phosphate ion (PO4^-3), sulfate ion (SO4^-2), sulfite (SO3^-2), nitrate ion (NO3^-) and so on into the night.

Since this is not my area of expertise, I searched Google under the key words "<I>polyatomic ion</I>" to get these possible sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polyatomic_ion
http://antoine.frostburg.edu/chem/senese/101/compounds/polyatomic.shtml#intro
http://www.800mainstreet.com/4/0004-009-Polyatomicions.html
http://www.answers.com/topic/polyatomic-ion

I hope this helps. Thanks for asking.

Since this is not my area of expertise, I searched Google under the key words "<I>polyatomic ion</I>" to get these possible sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polyatomic_ion
http://antoine.frostburg.edu/chem/senese/101/compounds/polyatomic.shtml#intro
http://www.800mainstreet.com/4/0004-009-Polyatomicions.html
http://www.answers.com/topic/polyatomic-ion

I hope this helps. Thanks for asking.