Cooridnate compound dentate

[Suhail Zaveri]

Hello chemistry community,

I have a question, how do you know if given a formula of a coordinate compound not written in parentheses like (CH2N(CH3COO)2)2 how do you know what dentate they are? I’m not able to understand?

[Andy Nguyen 1A]

I think to find the type of dentate a compound is you look at how many atoms have lone pairs. It helps to see the Lewis Structure and find those sites. For example, water has one atom, oxygen, with two lone pairs. Water is a monodentate because it only has one atom with a binding site.

[Elika Asis 3C]

The best way to figure out what kind of dentate a molecule is is to draw out the molecule out. Once you have it drawn out, then you should observe on how many atoms have negative formal charges or lone pairs, then count the sites where this is present, then that should be the type of dentate it is.