What is the word equation for sulfur plus oxygen?

Answer 1

"sulphur+oxygen->sulphur oxide."

Se + O2 under pressure renders SeO2 (selenium dioxide). "Comment on the fact that the analagous reaction between sulphur and oxygen, although extremely slow, gives a product with a different stoichiometry". Part 1A Inorganic Chemistry Paper, University of Oxford, 2008.

So the paper suggeststhat sulphur dioxide is not the product of direct combination of sulphur and oxygen. Why is this? Is it contaminated with some SO3?

I think it's actually sulphur dioxide rather than sulphur oxide as someone else suggested. If you look at the reaction of carbon and oxygen, it doesn't produce carbon oxide, but carbon dioxide. So therefore I think if:

Carbon + oxygen --> carbon dioxide

Then:

Sulphur + oxygen --> Sulphur dioxide

Answer 2

Sulphur + Oxygen --> sulphur dioxide

or

sulphur + oxygen --> sulphur trioxide

it depends on the conditions.

Answer 3

Sulfur + Oxygen → Sulfur Dioxide