What is the (name of the) molecular structure of AlCl3NH3 ?
3 answers
Probably tetrahedral.
tetrahedral even though there's eight domains...the 8 domains is what i had trouble with.
I didn't count it that way. I looked at it as Al with 3 chlorine atoms attached and a fourth where the NH3 (using it's two unpaired electrons) is attached to Al to complete the octet of Al. Then, of course, the electronic structure of NH3 I see as tetrahedral, also. Thus, I see two tetrahedral structures bonded at one corner. I don't know if this is correct or not. That's just my opinion. AlCl3 does something similar since it dimerizes to form Al2Cl6 and that's the way the Al completes the octet for both Al atoms.
2 answers