CHEMISTRY GLOSSARY

van der Waals’s radius    →   van der Waalsov radijus

Van der Waals’s radius is one half the distances between two nonbonded atoms, when attractive and repulsive forces between the atoms are balanced.

atom radius    →   radijus atoma

Atoms and molecules have no strict boundaries. The volume of a free atom is usually defined as that volume that contains 90 % of electron cloud. The radius of an atom represents half of interatom distance of two identical atoms which are in touch but are not interconnected either by a covalent or an ionic bond, but with a very weak van der Waals’s bond.

ionic radius    →   ionski radijus

Ionic radius is the radius of anions and cations in crystalline ionic compounds, as determined by consistently partitioning the center-to-center distance of ions in those compounds. In general, negative ions have larger ionic radii than positive ions.

van der Waals’ force    →   van der Waalsova sila

Van derWaals’ force is the weak attractive force between two molecules which arises from electric dipole interactions. It can lead to the formation of stable but weakly bound dimer molecules or clusters. They are named after the Dutch physicist Johannes van der Waals (1837-1923).

van der Waals’ equation    →   van der Waalsova jednadžba

Van der Waals’ equation is an equation of state for real fluids which takes the form:

where p is pressure, V_m is molar volume, T is temperature, R is the molar gas constant, and a and b are characteristic parameters of the substance which describe the effect of attractive and repulsive intermolecular forces.

halogens    →   halogeni elementi

Halogens are the elements fluorine (F) chlorine (Cl), bromine (Br), iodine (I), and astatine (At). They are non-metals, and make up part of the 17 group in the periodic table. Compounds of these elements are called halogenides or halides.

The halogens all have a strong unpleasant odour and will burn flesh. They do not dissolve well in water. The five elements are strongly electronegative. They are oxidising agents, with fluorine being the strongest and astatine being the weakest. They react with most metals and many non-metals.

Halogens form molecules which consist of atoms covalently bonded. With increasing atomic weight there is a gradation in physical properties. For example: Fluorine is a pale green gas of low density. Chlorine is a greenish-yellow gas 1.892 times as dense as fluorine. Bromine is a deep reddish-brown liquid which is three times as dense as water. Iodine is a grayish-black crystalline solid with a metallic appearance. And astatine is a solid with properties which indicate that it is somewhat metallic in character.

ideal gas    →   idealni plin

Ideal gas is a gas in which there is complete absence of cohesive forces between the component molecules; the behaviour of such a gas can be predicted accurately by the ideal gas equation through all ranges of temperature and pressure. The concept is theoretical, since no actual gas meets the ideal requirement.

lanthanides contraction    →   kontrakcija lantanoida

Lanthanides contraction is a reduction of metal and ion diameters from lanthanum to lutetium and it is caused by a core charge growth inside the same shell. Elements which in the periodic system of elements come after lanthanides have, because of lanthanides contraction, smaller diameter than they should have according to their position in the periodic system of elements.

Lennard-Jones potential    →   Lennard-Jonesov potencijal

The Lennard-Jones potential (or 12-6 potential) is a mathematically simple model that describes the interaction between two non-bonded and uncharged atoms (known as the van der Waals interaction). It was first proposed in 1924 by British physicist Sir John Edward Lennard-Jones (1894-1954). The Lennard-Jones Potential is given by the following equation

where V is the intermolecular potential between the two atoms or molecules, ε is the well depth and a measure of how strongly the two particles attract each other, σ is the distance at which the intermolecular potential between the two particles is zero, r is the distance of separation between centres of both particles.