What quality should an element possess to show the property of catenat...
Catenation is the linkage of atoms of the sameelement into longer chains. Catenation occurs most readily in carbon, which forms covalent bonds with other carbon atoms to form longer chains and structures.
Also it is occurring only among the atoms of an element that has a valence of at least two and that forms relatively strong bonds with itself.
The versatile chemistry of elemental sulfur is largely due to catenation. In the native state, sulfur exists as S8 molecules. On heating these rings open and link together giving rise to increasingly long chains, as evidenced by the progressive increase in viscosity as the chains lengthen.
Silicon can form sigma bonds to other silicon atoms. However, it is difficult to prepare and isolate SinH2n+2 with n greater than about 8, as their thermal stability decreases with increase in the number of silicon atoms.
Thus, from above explanation it can be clearly seen that Sulphur has more catenation than Silicon.
Some more info regarding Catenation:
The ability of an element to catenate is primarily based on the bond energy of the element to itself, which decreases with more diffuse orbitals (those with higher azimuthal quantum number) overlapping to form the bond. Hence, carbon, with the least diffuse valence shell p orbital is capable of forming longer p-p sigma bonded chains of atoms than heavier elements which bond via higher valence shell orbitals. Catenation ability is also influenced by a range of steric and electronic factors, including the electronegativity of the element in question, the molecular orbital hybridization and the ability to form different kinds of covalent bonds. For carbon, the sigma overlap between adjacent atoms is sufficiently strong that perfectly stable chains can be formed. With other elements this was once thought to be extremely difficult in spite of plenty of evidence to the contrary.