Diradical in the context of Octet rule

In chemistry, a superoxide is a compound that contains the superoxide ion, which has the chemical formula O−2. The systematic name of the anion is dioxide(1−). The reactive oxygen ion superoxide is particularly important as the product of the one-electron reduction of dioxygen O₂, which occurs widely in nature. Molecular oxygen (dioxygen) is a diradical containing two unpaired electrons, and superoxide results from the addition of an electron which fills one of the two degenerate molecular orbitals, leaving a charged ionic species with a single unpaired electron and a net negative charge of −1. Both dioxygen and the superoxide anion are free radicals that exhibit paramagnetism. Superoxide was historically also known as "hyperoxide".

Triplet oxygen, O₂, refers to the S = 1 electronic ground state of molecular oxygen (dioxygen). Molecules of triplet oxygen contain two unpaired electrons, making triplet oxygen an unusual example of a stable and commonly encountered diradical: it is more stable as a triplet than a singlet. According to molecular orbital theory, the electron configuration of triplet oxygen has two electrons occupying two π molecular orbitals (MOs) of equal energy (that is, degenerate MOs). In accordance with Hund's rules, they remain unpaired and spin-parallel, which accounts for the paramagnetism of molecular oxygen. These half-filled orbitals are antibonding in character, reducing the overall bond order of the molecule to 2 from the maximum value of 3 that would occur when these antibonding orbitals remain fully unoccupied, as in dinitrogen. The molecular term symbol for triplet oxygen is Σ
_g.