60d

Dilithium

Dilithium, Li2, is a strongly electrophilic, diatomic molecule comprising two lithium atoms covalently bonded together. Li2 is known in the gas phase. It has a bond order of 1, an internuclear separation of 267.3 pm and a bond energy of 102 kJ/mol or 1.06eV in each bond. The electron configuration of Li2 may be written as σ2. It has been observed that 1% (by mass) of lithium in the vapor phase is in the form of dilithium.Being the lightest stable neutral homonuclear diatomic molecule after H2, and the helium dimer, dilithium is an extremely important model system for studying fundamentals of physics, chemistry, and electronic structure theory. It is the most thoroughly characterized compound in terms of the accuracy and completeness of the empirical potent… more »