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Writer's pictureKalle Lintinen

Molecular Knot, Revisited

Already two months ago, I had figured out the principle of the knot-nature of the molecular bond. In the post “The Big Knot” I presented this image:

This is the general idea of the molecular bond. I also presented a shape that was supposed to reveal the lopsided nature of the molecular bond:



 I was about to say something about the accuracy of the above image but decided against it. Suffice it to say that the image provided me with an inspiration to look at the molecular knot from a different perspective.

 

However, to revisit the molecular knot with the angled equations I showed in my previous post, I would need to think of the knot in a more concrete manner. In my last post I presented this knot for the hydrogen molecule:

But looking at the knot more closely, this shape cannot be used for a molecular bond. This becomes evident when one introduces a dashed circle that depict the center around which both loops of dots refract:

In the above example there is absolutely no space for a second pair of loops that is required for a molecular bond.

 

To be able to add a second pair of loops, the circle of refraction must be expanded. Below is my first guess for the expanded circle. I’m not yet 100 % sure whether this is logical, but the idea seems valid:

While for a hydrogen atom, the radius was 2 cos(π/8), or √(2+√2) ≈ 1.848, in the above figure the radius is 1+√2 ≈ 2.414. However, as far as I see it, this stretched radius of refraction means that the opposite side of the bond is no longer symmetrical to the side participating in the molecular bond. Just by visual inspection it looks like it’s not possible to have a second molecular bond on the opposite side. This becomes rather apparent when one tries to find another ++ arrangement of dots around the circle of refraction with an identical size as in the image above. There’s no space for a proper bond.

Except, there seems to be one more twist when I tested the above shape with the equations, it became obvious that the shape was off. Rather, this is a shape that came out naturally:

However, looking at the image above, it seems that this arrangement of dots would mean that there are asymmetric forces in the hydrogen molecule (don’t ask me why: this is my intuition talking), so a new term probably must be introduced to the equation that introduces a new angle, producing a bond like this:

 So, is this the final shape of the molecular bond? The jury is still very much out on this. Although the image above looks logical and symmetrical, I can’t imagine yet how does this kind of a knot look like when displayed as an orbital and not some circles on a plane. I guess I’ll figure out soon enough whether my idea holds water.

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