Tuesday, 26 July 2016

electronegativity - Relative strengths of hydrogen bonds



Order of hydrogen bond strength:


OHN > OHO > NHN > NHO. Why is that so?



According to me OHO should have the maximum strength while NHN should have the weakest hydrogen bonds based on the fact that oxygen is more electronegative than nitrogen. It would develop a higher δ charge and the hydrogen attached to it will have a higher δ+ charge which would make the hydrogen bonding stronger.


I can't reason out the order given in my textbook. After observing it, all I can guess is that oxygen being highly electronegative leads to higher δ+ charge on hydrogen while nitrogen being less electronegative easily shares its electron cloud with hydrogen, making the hydrogen bond stronger.


I am not sure about this reason as according to this it is more stable for hydrogen to make a hydrogen bond with a less electronegative element and possibly even an electropositive element, (unless and until the hydrogen is attached to a highly electronegative element), which does not occur in normal circumstances.


It would be great if anybody could help me figure out the reason for the above trend.




Answer



As a short answer, Hydrogen bonds (for elementary chemistry) are formed with donation of lone pair of a lewis base into LUMO of H attached to a highly electronegative atom. A better donor makes a better bond and more electronegative atom makes a better bond. From my experience, the second factor overrides the first one in most cases.


N is a better donor than O and H in OH is a better acceptor than H in NH.


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