Question

Give reasons for the following:
Interhalogens are more reactive than pure halogens

Answer 1

A molecule that contains two or more separate halogen atoms is known as interhalogen compounds and this compound consists of no other group of elements except halogens. Most of these compounds are binary which is composed of only two different elements.

Complete step by step solution:
The compounds are formed when halogen group elements react with each other are interhalogen compounds. This means that a molecule consists of two or more different elements of group 17.
There are four types of interhalogen compounds,
(i) Diatomic interhalogens (AX)
(ii) Tetra atomic interhalogens ($A{{X}_{3}}$ )
(iii) Hexatomic interhalogens ( $A{{X}_{5}}$ )
(iv) octatomic interhalogens ( $A{{X}_{7}}$ )
-Except for F, interhalogens are more reactive than all halogens. Because the interhalogen bonds are weaker than the bond between two same halogen atoms. Electronegativity of atoms is the same for a diatomic halogen compound and different in the interhalogen compounds. So, the bonds in interhalogen compounds are polarized which is reasonable for breaking these bonds easily. Depends upon the size of the constituent halogens, the bond length of these compounds varies.
-For example, ${{I}_{2}}$ is less reactive than ICl, because the electronegativity ${{I}_{2}}$ is the same and due to the difference in electronegative of the two atoms, ICl is more polarized.

Note: An application of interhalogen compounds as non-aqueous solvents because these compounds are covalent and used as a catalyst. $U{{F}_{6}}$ Is used enrichment of U-235 by using $Cl{{F}_{3}}$ and $Br{{F}_{3}}$ . These interhalogen compounds are used as fluorinating compounds.