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QUESTION

# Which type of hybridization is found in the compound PF5 ?

"sp"^3"d"

In order to determine the of the central phosphorus atom in phosphorus pentafluoride, "PF"_5, you must first draw the compound's .

The molecule will have a total of 40 , 5 from the phosphorus atom, and 7 from each of the five fluorine atoms.

The phosphorus atom will be the molecule's central atom. It will form single bonds with the five fluorine atoms.

These will account for 10 of the 40 the molecule has. Each fluorine atom will have three lone pairs of electrons, which will account for the rest of the .

The molecule's Lewis structure will look like this

Now you need to focus on the central atom, more specifically on how many regions of electron surround the central atom - this is known as the steric number

A region of electron density can be a covalent bond - single, double, and triple bonds all count as one region of electron density - or a lone pair of electrons.

Notice that phosphorus is bonded to five fluorine atoms and has no lone pairs of electrons attached, which means that it is surrounded by a total of five regions of electron density, which is equivalent to saying that it has a steric number equal to 5.

The steric number gives you the number of hybrid orbitals. In this case, a steric number of 5 means that the phosphorus atom will have 6

• one s-orbital
• three p-orbitals
• one d-orbital

As a result, the central atom will be "sp"^3"d" hybridized.