Orientations of D Orbitals - Video Tutorials & Practice Problems

d Orbital Orientations

In this video, we're gonna take a look at the orientation of the orbitals. Now recall that an orbital is the area around nucleus where an electron is most likely to be found. And we're gonna say that there are five D orbitals with different orientations. These orientations themselves can be grouped into two sets. So we have orientations that lie in between our axis and those that lie on or along the axis. Your professor, you might hear them say on the axis and in another instance, you might hear them say along the axis. These are synonymous with one another. They mean the same thing. Now, before we talk about these different types of orientations, remember we have our axis, we typically have our X axis oriented this way, our Y is oriented this way and then our Z is vertical for the first three axes. We're gonna say these are the ones that lie in between the axes. And in each of these three, we've highlighted a particular orbital lobe for the first one, the highlighted lobe is up front and it's in between X and Y. That's why this orbital is designated as DXY. The next one is in between Y and Z. So this one is designated DYZ. And then finally, we have this one that's highlighted in between X and Z. And that's why it's called DXZ. For the last two, they are on the axis or along the axis. And if you notice, you can see that they, that the axis themselves kind of go through two of the lobes and those lobes lie on the X and Y axis. That's why this one is DX squared minus Y squared. And then finally, this last one here, it's along the y axis and it pierces both all the way through. So that's why this one is DZ squared. So these are our five different types of orbitals each with their orientation. The first three are in between the axes and the last two are on or along the axis.

Orientations of d Orbitals Example

Here, it says an electron in which of the following orbital is the most likely to be found along the X and Y axis. So they set along the axis or on the axis. So there's only two possibilities. And those are D sub X squared minus Y squared or DZ squared. We can see from the designations here we're talking about along the X and Y axis. The first one is the one that contains those two variables of X and Y. So here that would mean that answer or option D would have to be our correct answer. The first three do not work because they are in between the axis and then DZ squared. Here, we're talking about the one that's predominantly on X and Y and that have to be option D over option E.

In which of the following orbitals an electron is the most likely to be found along the z axis?

• A. d_xy
• B. d_yz
• C. d_xz
• D. d_x²–y²
• E. d_z²