It is clear that both the hexaamminecobalt(III) ion and the hexakis(trifluoromethyl)cobaltate(III) ion are both low spin (the former is already low spin, and the trifluoromethyl ligand is clearly softer than the ammine ligand) and therefore valence isoelectronic to each other, since the Jahn-Tell...

According to the NIST database, the ground-state configuration of plutonium(VIII) is [Hg]5f³6p³, when intuitively it should be the same as neutral radon([Hg]6p⁶). Since plutonium(VIII) compounds are already known, there are two problems: the plutonium(VIII) cation is paramagnetic; the core 6p sh...

It makes me slightly sad to write this, but after having been a moderator for more than five years, I will be stepping down later this month. This is primarily because I don't have enough time and effort to devote to SE anymore, which is in turn because of Real Life. Most of you will no doubt hav...

In this question it is asked why ferrocene is colored when the HOMO-LUMO gap seems to be beyond the visible light range. I tried to answer that orbital energies change with electronic transitions and therefore the transition energy need not match the difference in orbital energies. However, my an...