The key here is to recognize that the chemical bonding behavior of sulfur and tellurium are quite similar, but not the same. They are in the same group, so they have the same number of valence electrons; in general this means they'll tend to bond in the same ways. But the activation energy to form the same compounds can be quite different, and some essentially never form.Just as there is sulfur trioxide `SO_3` that...
The key here is to recognize that the chemical bonding behavior of sulfur and tellurium are quite similar, but not the same. They are in the same group, so they have the same number of valence electrons; in general this means they'll tend to bond in the same ways. But the activation energy to form the same compounds can be quite different, and some essentially never form.
Just as there is sulfur trioxide `SO_3` that can bond with water `H_2 O ` to make sulfuric acid `H_2 SO_4` , there is also tellurium trioxide `TeO_3` . But tellurium trioxide has such a high activation energy to bond with water that it is largely unreactive with it.
There is an acidic compound of tellurium and water, but it is different; it's called orthotelluric acid, and it has the formula `Te(OH)_6` .
Unfortunately, predicting this outcome from first principles would actually be quite difficult; it involves some pretty complicated things about the quantum mechanics of different electron orbital hybridizations.
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