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Bonding and antibonding molecular orbitals
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[QUOTE="DrClaude, post: 5012350, member: 461323"] The wave function. The statement stems from building molecular orbitals (MO) by the Linear Combination of Atomic Orbitals (LCAO) method, where you would take an orbital (##\phi##) on each atom and make a linear combination to build the MO (##\psi##). For two atoms A and B, you get $$ \begin{align} \psi_+ &= \frac{1}{\sqrt{2}} \left( \phi_A +\phi_B \right) \\ \psi_- &= \frac{1}{\sqrt{2}} \left( \phi_A - \phi_B \right) \end{align} $$ In the case of ##\psi_+## you get "constructive interference," as the two atomic orbitals ##\phi## add up, and "destructive interference" for ##\psi_-##. As the atomic orbitals are centered on different atoms, this interference takes place in between the atoms, such that the electron density is increased (##\psi_+##) or decreased and has a node (##\psi_-##) between the nuclei, leading to a reduction or an increase in the nuclear Coulomb repulsion, respectively. [/QUOTE]
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Bonding and antibonding molecular orbitals
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