How Many Orbitals are Occupied in a Silicon Atom? Exploring Silicon’s Orbital Occupancy
A silicon atom has 14 electrons in total. The electronic configuration of silicon is 1s² 2s² 2p⁶ 3s² 3p². To determine the number of orbitals that are occupied, you can count the unique combinations of quantum numbers for each electron. In the case of silicon: Adding these up, you get a total of 9 orbitals…