Structure and Properties
Dinitrogen tetroxide forms an equilibrium mixture with nitrogen dioxide. The molecule is planar with an N-N bond distance of 1.78 Å and N-O distances of 1.19 Å. The N-N distance corresponds to a weak bond, since it is significantly longer than the average N-N single bond length of 1.45 Å.
Unlike NO2, N2O4 is diamagnetic since it has no unpaired electrons. The liquid is also colorless but can appear as a brownish yellow liquid due to the presence of NO2 according to the following equilibrium:
- N2O4 ⇌ 2 NO2
Higher temperatures push the equilibrium towards nitrogen dioxide. Inevitably, some dinitrogen tetroxide is a component of smog containing nitrogen dioxide.
Read more about this topic: Dinitrogen Tetroxide
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