I performed this experiment today and I have to do some discussion questions on it. Why is there more magnesium oxide formed than magnesium nitride when there is so much more nitrogen in the air? i dont get it....
2007-03-19 12:53:00 · 3 answers · asked by Anonymous in Science & Mathematics ➔ Chemistry
Nitrogen is a highly unreactive element and so it needs a very high amount of energy to combine with other atoms.
This is shown as Nitrogen and Oxygen are both in the air but if you light a flame you dont make oxides of nitrogen. Instead these can be formed inside spark plugs in car engines and at lightning sparks as the energy here is extremely high. =]
Oxygen is more reactive than Nitrogen and so much more of the MgO will be formed.
2007-03-19 12:59:31 · answer #1 · answered by Maureen 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
What Maureen said is true. But, Oxygen also has a nature a natural affinity for Magnesium due to their ion charges.
When ionized, Mg has a +2 charge and O has a -2 charge so the to elements are naturally attracted to each other in a 1 to 1 ratio.
For Mg to bond with N (-3 charge) in a stable manner 3 Mg need to bond with 2 N ----> Mg3N2
This takes a lot more energy to do because there are 5 atoms bonding together instead of only 2.
2007-03-19 13:02:10 · answer #2 · answered by evokid 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
It may be to do with the charges on ions - Mg2+ is the oxidation state for magnesium typically and oxygen is 2- MgO is the favoured compound as it is more stable. Alos look at limiting reagents in your text book .
2007-03-19 13:03:02 · answer #3 · answered by Aquarian Smurf 1 · 0⤊ 0⤋