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  • Covalent Ionic Hydrogen Van Der Waals Strength Order

Covalent Ionic Hydrogen Van Der Waals Strength Order

On the order of strength and weakness of all forces
The forces of the world, covalent forces, ionic forces, hydrogen bond forces, van der Waals forces, the order of their strength and weakness cannot be ignored.

Covalent forces are the forces that form bonds between atoms by sharing electron pairs. Its electron clouds are tightly overlapped, and the atoms are bound to each other, as if they were one. It is very strong because of the covalent force. If you want to break it, you must consume a lot of energy. Looking at the world, the strength of diamond depends on the covalent bonds between the carbon atoms inside it. Its atoms are arranged regularly, and the covalent forces are intertwined like a network, so that its hardness is the best of all things. This is evidence of the strong covalent force.

The ionic force is also the electrostatic attractive force between anions and cations. Ions attract each other with electric charges to form a lattice structure. Although it is not as close as the covalent force of the shared electrons, the charge phase of anions and cations is also quite strong. Such as table salt (sodium chloride), its crystal is stable, and it is not easy to disintegrate at room temperature and pressure, which is the work of the ion force. When the ion charge is high and the radius is small, the ionic force is stronger. Due to the increase of the charge attractive force, the ion spacing is reduced.

The hydrogen bond force is the interaction between a hydrogen atom and an electronegative atom (such as fluorine, oxygen, and nitrogen) after combining with another electronegative large atom. Although it is called a "bond", it is actually weaker than the covalent bond and ionic bond. However, it plays an extraordinary role in life phenomena. Many properties of water, such as high boiling point and high specific heat capacity, are caused by hydrogen bonds between water molecules. Hydrogen bonds attract water molecules to each other, increasing the force between molecules, causing water to need more energy to break free from bondage and change state.

Van der Waals force is a weak interaction that generally exists between molecules. It originates from the effects of instantaneous dipoles and induced dipoles of molecules. Compared with the first three, van der Waals force is weakest. For example, rare gases, only rely on van der Waals force to condense into liquid or solid states. If the temperature is slightly increased, the molecules will break free from this weak bondage and become gaseous due to the increase in energy. From this perspective, the covalent force is the strongest, the ion force is second, the hydrogen bond force is second, and the van der Waals force is the weakest. The strength order of covalent, ion, hydrogen bond, and van der Waals force is the key rule in the exploration of material structure and properties. Only by understanding this can one or two of the mysteries of matter be glimpsed.