Bond length variation within electronic configurations of diatomic molecules

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Abstract
The relative magnitudes of bond lengths within a given electronic configuration of a diatomic molecule are found to depend on the nature of the main bonding orbital involved. It is proposed that, subject to certain restrictions, the bond length decreases with the energy of the state if the main bonding orbital is an outer orbital (as in the ground configuration of O2) but increases with decreasing energy if the main bonding orbital is an inner orbital (as in singly excited H2).