Is Fe paramagnetic?

[JNew]

Something like Fe which in it's ground state has a configuration of [Ar]4s2 3p6 would this be paramagnetic or diamagnetic. I assume diamagnetic because the valence shell of 4s2 is all paired. So do we only care about the pairing of the valence shell electrons, and not any of the inner shells? Why is that so?

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[system7]

I thought if you had any unpaired electrons, even one unpaired, in any shell, it would be paramagnetic. Fe has 4 unpaired electrons in its 3d subshell, therefore it will be paramagnetic unless i'm totally wrong on this.

 

[UndergradGuy7]

Something like Fe which in it's ground state has a configuration of [Ar]4s2 3p6 would this be paramagnetic or diamagnetic. I assume diamagnetic because the valence shell of 4s2 is all paired. So do we only care about the pairing of the valence shell electrons, and not any of the inner shells? Why is that so?

Fe is [Ar] 4s2 3d6. And yes it is paramagentic. It has 4 unpaired electrons in the 3d subshell.

The inner shell has to be all paired in order to have valence shells... or else it would not be in the ground state. For example you can't have 1s1 2s2 2p6... in the ground state.

 

[IdahoDoc]

Fe is [Ar] 4s2 3d6. And yes it is paramagentic. It has 4 unpaired electrons in the 3d subshell.

The inner shell has to be all paired in order to have valence shells... or else it would not be in the ground state. For example you can't have 1s1 2s2 2p6... in the ground state.

Another thing to note is paramagnetic will has have an attracting to magnetic field while diamagnetic will have a slight repulsion to a magnetic field. So without even looking at the electrons we know it has to be paramagnetic.