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Asked by maya12 to Kieren, Kate, Nicola, Rowena, Roy on 11 Mar 2014. This question was also asked by .
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Kieren Bradley answered on 11 Mar 2014:
An oxide in general is a chemical compound that involves oxygen and some other materials, often metals. Zinc is a metal, usually used as a coating on top of other metals to stop them from rusting; which is actually what an oxide is, usually you think of rust of iron objects, and you get iron oxide. When iron oxide forms it still allows the iron underneath to form iron oxide until eventually your car falls apart because it is too rusty (happened to my car in Portsmouth, being by the sea made it happen quicker). If you put zinc oxide on top then the iron underneath can’t turn into iron oxide so you don’t have problems with rusting. I’ll put an electron microscopy image of my zinc oxide nanorods onto my profile page.
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Rowena Fletcher-Wood answered on 17 Mar 2014:
It’s not as complicated as it sounds! Zinc oxide is a compound formed from two elements: zinc and oxygen. It is an ionic compound, which makes it a solid and means it is bonded by opposite charges attracting. Zinc gives up two electrons to form zinc +2 and oxygen gains two electrons to form oxygen -2. This gives them full or empty shells of electrons.
One zinc then combines with one oxygen making ZnO, zinc oxide. Except charge isn’t directional , so another oxygen is attracted to the zinc and another zinc to that oxygen and so on, building up to form a giant structure arranged neatly in space, which is the solid. I am a solid state chemist, so I like looking at what patterns the ions are arranged in. 🙂
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Kate Nicholson answered on 17 Mar 2014:
To me its a white pigment that can be found in lost of things, from sticking plasters to chinese plates!
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