Lewis structures (also known as Lewis dot diagrams, electron dot diagrams, Lewis dot formulas, Lewis dot structures, and electron dot structures) are diagrams that show the bonding between atoms of a molecule and the lone pairs of electrons that may exist in the molecule. A Lewis structure can be drawn for any covalently bonded molecule, as well as coordination compounds. The Lewis structure was named after Gilbert N. Lewis, who introduced it in his 1916 article The Atom and the Molecule.