What is the oxidation state in simple substances?

The oxidation state indicates the amount of electric charge on an atom, assuming that the electron pairs involved in the formation of the bond are completely biased towards the more electronegative atoms.

In simple substances, a bond is formed between identical atoms with the same electronegativity value, therefore, the electron pair does not shift towards any particular atom, which means there is no charge on it.

The oxidation state of free atoms and simple substances is 0.



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