For polar molecules, when does hydrogen bonding occur?

1 Answer
Sep 5, 2017

Well, for a start, the polar molecule BY SPECIFICATION, must contain hydrogen atoms bound to a electronegative element......to engage in hydrogen bonding.....

Explanation:

And three molecules may be used as exemplars: H2O; NH3; and HF....and a special type of bond polarity, of charge separation operates......

For each molecule we could represent the dipoles, the charge separation this way: δ+HδOδ+H; δNδ+H3; δ+HδF. In the bulk solvent, the dipoles line up in solution, and in aggregate this constitutes a potent intermolecular force.

If you interrogate the boiling points of these molecules (and you should, because as a physical scientist always must consider the actual data), certainly you will find the boiling points anomalously high. Certainly they are high compared to homologous, H2S, PH3, and HCl for which hydrogen bonding does not operate so strongly, and dispersion forces (as might be expected for larger, many electron, molecules) are not large enuff to compensate.