Can someone please help me with these questions? Detailed answers would be highl

Question

Can someone please help me with these questions? Detailed answers would be highly appreciated. Thanks!

Elemental carbon forms either a graphite layer structure or a diamond cubic crystal structure. What type of bonding would you expect to find in elemental carbon and whether you think that is the type of bonding seen in both structures? Explain why the bonding in graphite allows you to write with graphite Diamonds are one of the hardest materials known compared to graphite which is soft. Why is diamond so different? How do you think the carbon-carbon bond lengths in graphite compare to those in in diamond explain the differences

Explanation / Answer

Elemental carbon is amorphous carbon are it has localized pi-bond sand dangling bonds present in it unlike in graphite which has delocalized pi - bonds.

This type of bonding is not seen in either graphite or diamond.

Graphite contains layers of carbon atoms. Graphite has a layered structure, these are planar in nature. In each layer, the carbon atoms are arranged in a honeycomb like units. They stack on top of each other without any strong bonds between them and so graphite is soft as each layer can slide on each other.

Diamond has tetrahedrally bondede carbon atoms the units are bond to each other indefinitely in 3 dimension. This makes the units verys strong on top of that the C-C bonds are very strong. A lot of energy is needed to separate the atoms in diamond. so it is an extremely strong material.

Carbon carbon dond length in diamond verus graphite are 154 pm and 142 pm and interlayer distance is 341pm

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