Is an 8s subshell/orbital possible?

[Zellmer, Robert]

I often get questions about EOC exercise 6.61.  This question asks which are
impossible combinations of n and l. Hopefully, you did this problem and
understood there is no 1p or 2d.

When I was going through the periodic table while writing the electron
configuration we saw that the two rows below the main body of the PT (the
inner transition elements) are part of rows 6 and 7 and the 4f and 5f are
being filled, respectively.  The 5f is part of row 7 which ends with the 7p
orbitals being filled.  Thus, there are no atoms in their ground states with
electrons in orbitals beyond the 7p.

So, does something like an 8s, 10p, 6f, etc exist?  I posed a similar question
during lecture.

Of course they do.  Think of things we covered in class (and you'll see it in the
EMS exp).  Hydrogen has 1 electron in the 1s subshell in its ground state.  Are
there other levels, such as the 2nd (n=2), 3rd (n=3),  etc.?  Of course there are.
There's simply no electrons present in those shells until the 1s electron is
excited there by an input of energy to get an excited state.  Just because there
are no electrons in an 8s or 6f or 10p, etc., subshell (orbitals) in the ground
states of any of the known elements doesn't mean the subshells don't exist.
Remember,  there was a time we didn't even know about the elements in the
bottom two rows with electrons in the 4f and 5f.  Does that mean they didn't
exist?  Of course they did.  Elements with electrons in those subshells just
hadn't been discovered yet.  We don't technically "see" these unoccupied
orbitals until we excite an electron to them.  Then we know they are there
and can determine the energy of this orbital and what type of orbital it is.

I hope this clears up any questions about this.

Dr. Zellmer
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