Although solid metallic Au is very unreactive, the opposite is true of gaseous gold. It very readily forms compounds with well over half the periodic table.
Some 40 years ago my DPhil research concerned the spectroscopy of the diatomic molecules CeO and Cu2. I learned then that more AuX compounds had been characterized with an element X other than, perhaps, oxygen which forms XO molecules. Hydrogen, forming HX, came a distant third.
If a sub-topic about this is decided to be worthwhile, I will try to dig up appropriate references and write the text. Xilman (talk) 16:39, 24 March 2024 (UTC)
- Hi User:Xilman. I think content about that sort of topic would definitely be worth having. It's on-topic and seemingly not mentioned in the article we have now. And it's such a contrast to its behavior in the solid state (and the "common knowlege" based on it). I haven't looked at gold chemistry in many years so I don't know any of the current literature. DMacks (talk) 20:22, 24 March 2024 (UTC)
- Hi Xilman: I see that there is also an article called Gold compounds that was created here in 2022 as a copy of the Gold#Chemistry section, and it remains nearly word-for-word identical in both articles. Ideally Gold compounds would be the in-depth article, with a summary here at Gold. Please add AuX information where you think it makes sense and I'd be glad to help organize. –MadeOfAtoms (talk) 04:23, 25 March 2024 (UTC)
- Good idea. The sub-heading might be something simple like "Gaseous compounds". Xilman (talk) 15:20, 25 March 2024 (UTC)