Abstract
IN the course of the development of the resonating-valence-bond theory of metals1 it became evident2 that the characteristic structural feature of metals is the possession by each of many atoms in the metal of an extra orbital (the metallic orbital) in addition to the orbitals normally occupied by electrons. This metallic orbital permits the unsynchronized resonance of covalent bonds from one interatomic position to another by the jump of an electron from one atom to an adjacent atom without the need for an opposite jump to retain exact electric neutrality. The metal can thus be described as con taining atoms with formal charges + 1 and − 1 as well as zero (larger formal charges are ruled out by the electroneutrality principle3).
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References
Pauling, L., Phys. Rev., 54, 899 (1938).
Pauling, L., Nature, 161, 1019 (1948).
Pauling, L., The Nature of the Chemical Band, third ed., 399 (Oxford University Press, 1960).
Pauling, L., Proc. Roy. Soc., A, 196, 343 (1949).
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PAULING, L. Nature of the Metallic Orbital. Nature 189, 656 (1961). https://doi.org/10.1038/189656a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/189656a0
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