Drawing the Lewis Structure for I2

Viewing Notes:

  • I2 is a purple gas (very pretty). The I2 Lewis structure is similar to F2, Cl2, and Br2 since F, Cl, Br, and I are all in Group 7 and have 7 valence electrons.
  • For the I2 Lewis structure there are a total of 14 valence electrons available.


Transcript: This is Dr. B. We're going to draw the Lewis structure for I2, Iodine gas, a very pretty purple gas. So let's start out. Iodine is in group 7 of the periodic table. That means it has 7 valence electrons, so we have 7. But we have two Iodine atoms, so we need to multiply that by two, giving us a total of 14 valence electrons. So we're going to spread those 14 valence electrons around the two Iodine atoms, form a chemical bond, and fulfill the octets so that each Iodine has eight valence electrons.

So let's draw an I here, and let's put this and make sure they look like I's. OK. So we'll start first by putting two between them to form the chemical bond. So we've used 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12, 14, which is how many we have to work with; and let's see if we have octets. This Iodine has 2, 4, 6, 8; and this Iodine also has 8. We use a total of 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12, 14, which is how many we had to start out with.

That's the Lewis structure for Iodine. We could also draw it, if we wanted to, as a structural formula, and that would look like this right here where these two bonding electrons are represented by this single line right here. So that line means two valence bonding electrons.

This is Dr. B., and thanks for watching.