Sodium hydride, NaH, crystallizes in a face-centered cubic
unit ...

Question

Sodium hydride, NaH, crystallizes in a face-centered cubic 
unit cell similar to that of NaCl (Figure 12.11). How many 
Na+ ions touch each H- ion, and how many H- ions touch 
each Na+ ion?

Accepted Answer

Hey everyone, we're told that magnesium oxide follows the rock salt structure like that of sodium chloride, determine the coordination number for the magnesium plus two and oxygen minus two charged ions. First, I'm going to bring up our rock salt structure right here and we can go ahead and let blue Symbolize our magnesium with a plus deer charge while orange is going to symbolize our oxygen with a -2 charge. Now, looking at our structure, we can see that each magnesium ion is in contact with six oxygen ions, while each oxygen ion is also in contact with six magnesium ion, so our coordination number of magnesium Is going to be six. Similarly, our coordination number of oxygen is also going to be six, and this is going to be our final answer. Now, I hope that made sense and let us know if you have any questions.

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