Question

Uses of covalent compounds???

Answer 1

Humans and all other living things are almost exclusively a carbon based slurry of solutions, emulsions, colloidal suspensions and other mixtures. Most of our chemistry is water based with all the carbon bits in solution or suspension.

Carbon, as you should know, tends to form 4 covalent bonds. When it bonds exclusively with other carbon atoms the bond is purely covalent and the bonding pair of electrons is shared equally between the two carbon atoms. In a regular tetrahedral array this is called diamond. It is one of carbon’s allotropes. You can look up the others.

Carbon forms bonds with many other elements. These bonds are not purely covalent as each atom in the bond will have a differing ability to attract the bonding electrons (electronegativity). This creates a bond that has some ionic character with unequal electron pair sharing or transfer in a purely ionic bond. The greater the difference in electronegativity the more ionic the bond.

In the grand scheme of things, the majority of the intramolecular bonds (between atoms in a molecule) in the body, including the water, are covalent.

There must be bonds between adjacent molecules or we would fly apart into a gaseous blob. These intermolecular bonds (between molecules) take many forms but suffice to say they are what hold us together.