What are the symbols with oxidation numbers for sulfuric acid? What is the formula?

1 Answer
Monzur R.
Dec 5, 2016

I can only assume what you are trying to ask in your question, but sulfur has an oxidation number of 8, oxygen has an oxidation number of −2 and hydrogen has an oxidation number of 1.

Explanation:

In sulfuric acid, the molecular formula is H2SO4. Oxygen almost always has an oxidation number of −2, so 4 oxygen atoms means the charge is 8−. Sulfur, in this case, has an oxidation number of +6, which means that SO4 ion has an overall charge of 2−. Thus we need to hydrogen atoms to balance the charges.

![www.wikimedia.org](useruploads.socratic.org).

As you can see, sulfur has donated six electrons, each oxygen atom has accepted two electrons and each hydrogen atom has donated one electron.

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