Atomic

In chemistry an atom something that cannot be divided") is the

smallest particle still characterizing a chemical element.

An atom consists of a dense nucleus of positively-charged protons and

electrically-neutral neutrons, surrounded by a much larger electron

cloud consisting of negatively-charged electrons. An atom is

electrically neutral if it has the same number of protons as electrons.

The number of protons in an atom defines the chemical element to

which it belongs, while the number of neutrons determines the isotope

of the element.

Subatomic particles
Though the word atom originally denoted a particle that cannot be cut

into smaller particles, in modern scientific usage the 'atom' is

composed of various subatomic particles. The basic particles of an

atom consist of the electron, the proton and, for atoms other than

hydrogen-1, the neutron.

The electron is by far the least massive of these particles at 9.11×10 -

31
kg, with a negative electrical charge and a size that is so small as to

be currently unmeasurable. Protons have a positive charge and a mass

1,836 times that of the electron, at 1.67×10 -27 kg, although atomic

binding energy changes can reduce this. Neutrons have no electrical

charge and have a free mass of 1,839 times the mass of electrons.

Neutrons and protons have comparable dimensions—on the order of

2.5×10-15 m—although the 'surface' of these particles is not very

sharply defined.

Both protons and neutrons are themselves now thought to be composed

of even more elementary particles, called quarks. The quark forms one

of the two basic constituents of matter, the other being the lepton, of

which the electron is an example. There are six different types of

quarks, and each has a fractional electric charge of either +2/3 or

−1/3. Protons are composed of two up quarks and one down quark, while

a neutron consists of one up quark and two down quarks. The quarks

are held together by the strong nuclear force, mediated by

elementary particles called gluons.

Nucleus
All of the bound protons and neutrons in an atom make up a dense,

massive atomic nucleus, and are collectively called nucleons. Although

the positive charge of protons causes them to repel each other, they

are bound together with the neutrons by a short-ranged attractive

potential called the residual strong force.

Atoms of the same element have the same number of protons, called

the atomic number. Within a single element, the number of neutrons

may vary, determining the isotope of that element. The number of

neutrons relative to the protons determines the stability of the

nucleus, with certain isotopes undergoing radioactive decay because of

the weak force.

A nuclear fusion process that forms a deuterium nucleus from two

protons. A positron (e+)—an antimatter electron—is emitted along with

an electron neutrino.
The number of protons and neutrons in the atomic nucleus can be

modified, although this can require very high energies because of the

strong force. Nuclear fusion occurs when additional protons or

neutrons collide with the nucleus. Nuclear fission is the opposite

process, causing the nucleus to emit some amount of nucleons—usually

through radioactive decay. The nucleus can also be modified through

bombardment by high energy subatomic particles or photons. In such

processes which change the number of protons in a nucleus, the atom

becomes an atom of a different chemical element.

The fusion of two nuclei that have lower atomic numbers than iron and

nickel is an exothermic process that releases more energy than is

required to bring them together. It is this energy-releasing process

that makes nuclear fusion in stars a self-sustaining reaction. The net

loss of energy from the fusion reaction also means that the mass of

the fused nuclei is lower than the combined mass of the individual

nuclei. The energy released (E) is described by Albert Einstein's mass–

energy equivalence formula, E = mc², where m is the mass loss and c is

the speed of light.

The binding energy per nucleon increases with increasing atomic

number until iron or nickel is reached. For heavier nuclei, the binding

energy begins to decrease. That means fusion processes with nuclei

that have higher atomic numbers is an endothermic process. These

more massive nuclei can not undergo an energy-producing fusion

reaction that can sustain the hydrostatic equilibrium of a star.

Eventually, at sufficiently high atomic numbers, the binding energy

becomes negative, resulting in an unstable nucleus.

Electron cloud
The electrons form a much larger electron cloud surrounding the

nucleus. These electrons are bound to the protons in the nucleus by

the electromagnetic force. The number of electrons associated with

an atom is most easily changed, due to the lower energy of binding of

electrons.

Atoms are electrically neutral if they have an equal number of protons

and electrons. Atoms which have either a deficit or a surplus of

electrons are called ions. Electrons that are furthest from the nucleus

may be transferred to other nearby atoms or shared between atoms.

By this mechanism atoms are able to bond into molecules and other

types of chemical compounds like ionic and covalent network crystals.

Elements
An element consists of all atoms that have the same number of

protons in their nuclei. Each element can have multiple isotopes—nuclei

with specific numbers of protons and neutrons. Even hydrogen, the

simplest of elements, has isotopes deuterium and tritium. The known

elements form a continual range of atomic numbers from hydrogen up

to element 118, ununoctium. All known isotopes of elements with atomic

numbers greater than 82 are radioactive.

The chemical elements are often displayed in a periodic table that is

laid out to display recurring chemical properties. Elements with similar

chemical properties are aligned in vertical columns. The horizontal

rows correspond to the filling of a quantum shell of electrons. Thus

the elements at the far right have their outer shell completely filled

with electrons, which results in chemically very inert elements known

as the noble gases.

Size
Atoms lack a well-defined outer boundary, so the dimensions are

usually described in terms of the distances between two nuclei when

the atoms are bonded. The radius varies with the location of an atom

on the atomic chart. The smallest atom is helium with a radius of

31 pm, while the largest known is caesium at 298 pm. Although

hydrogen has a lower atomic number than helium, the calculated radius

of the hydrogen atom is about 70% larger.

Various analogies have been used to demonstrate the minuteness of

the atom. A typical human hair is about 1 million carbon atoms in width.

An HIV virion is the width of 800 carbon atoms and contains about 100

million atoms total. An E. coli bacterium contains perhaps 100 billion

atoms, and a typical human cell roughly 100 trillion atoms. A speck of
dust might contain 3 trillion atoms. A single drop of water contains

about 2 sextillion (2×1021) atoms of oxygen, and twice as many

hydrogen atoms. If an apple was magnified to the size of the Earth,

then the atoms in the apple would be approximately the size of the

original apple.

Origin
The first nuclei, including most of the hydrogen, helium, lithium, and

essentially all of the deuterium and helium-3 in the universe, were

theoretically created during big bang nucleosynthesis, about 3 minutes

after the big bang. The first atoms were theoretically created

380,000 years after the big bang; an epoch called recombination, when

the expanding universe cooled enough to allow electrons to become

attached to nuclei. Since then, atomic nuclei have been combined in

stars through the process of nuclear fusion to generate atoms up to

iron. Some atoms such as lithium-6 are generated in space through

cosmic ray spallation. Elements heavier than iron were generated in

supernovae through the r-process and in AGB stars through the s-

process, both of which involve the capture of neutrons by atomic

nuclei. Some elements, such as lead, formed largely through the

radioactive decay of heavier elements.

Most of the atoms that currently make up the Earth and all its

inhabitants were present in their current form in the nebula that

collapsed out of a molecular cloud to form the solar system. The rest
are the result of radioactive decay, and their relative proportion can

be used to determine the age of the earth through radiometric dating.

Most of the helium on earth is a product of alpha-decay.

There are a few trace atoms on Earth that were not present at the

beginning, nor are results of radioactive decay. Carbon-14 is

continuously generated by cosmic rays in the atmosphere. Some atoms

on Earth have been artificially generated either deliberately or as by-

products of nuclear reactors or explosions, including all the plutonium

and technetium on the earth.

Atomism
In natural philosophy, atomism is the theory that all the objects in the

universe are composed of very small, indestructible building blocks -

atoms. Or, stated in other words, that all of reality is made of

indivisible basic building blocks. The word atomism derives from the

ancient Greek word atomos which can be parsed in to a-tomos (not

cuttable) - tomos being a form of the Greek verb temnein (to cut) -

meaning that which cannot be cut into smaller pieces . Atomists are

sometimes called Later Ionians.

Of importance to the philosophical concept of atomism is the historical

accident that the particles that chemists and physicists of the early

19th century thought were indivisible, and therefore identified with

the uncuttable a-toms of long tradition, were found in the 20th

century to be composed of even smaller entities: electrons, neutrons,

and protons. Further experiments showed that protons and neutrons

are made of even more fundamental quarks. These particles at present

show no experimental evidence of size or substructure. However, the

trend of empirical evidence for ever-smaller subatomic particles raises

the question: "Is matter infinitely divisible?" Since absence of

evidence does not amount to evidence of absence, experiment cannot

answer this question.

Thus, as regards quarks, electrons, and other fundamental leptons are

concerned, the possibility that they too are composed of smaller

particles cannot be ruled out. In the mean-time, however, it is these

particles (not chemical atoms) which remain the best candidates for

the traditional indivisible objects, with which historical atomism has

concerned itself.

Atomic theory
In chemistry and physics, atomic theory is a theory of the nature of

matter, which states that matter is composed of discrete units called

atoms, as opposed to obsolete beliefs that matter could be divided

into any arbitrarily small quantity.

Atomic theory began hundreds of years ago as a philosophical concept,

and in the 19th century achieved widespread scientific acceptance

thanks to discoveries in the field of stoichiometry. The chemists of

the era believed the basic units of the elements were also the

fundamental particles of nature and named them atoms (derived from

the Greek word atomos, meaning "indivisible"). However, around the

turn of the 20th century, through various experiments with

electromagnetism and radioactivity, physicists discovered that the so-

called "indivisible atom" was actually a conglomerate of various

subatomic particles (chiefly, electrons, protons and neutrons) which

can exist separately from each other. In fact, in certain extreme

environments such as neutron stars, extreme temperature and

pressure prevents atoms from existing at all. The field of science

which studies subatomic particles is particle physics, and it is in this

field that physicists hope to discover the true fundamental nature of

matter.

Introduction to quantum mechanics

Quantum mechanics (QM, or quantum theory) is a physical science

dealing with the behaviour of matter and energy on the scale of atoms

and subatomic particles / waves. QM also forms the basis for the

contemporary understanding of how very large objects such as stars

and galaxies, and cosmological events such as the Big Bang, can be

analyzed and explained. Quantum mechanics is the foundation of

several related disciplines including nanotechnology, condensed matter

physics, quantum chemistry, structural biology, particle physics, and

electronics.

The term "quantum mechanics" was first coined by Max Born in 1924.

The acceptance by the general physics community of quantum

mechanics is due to its accurate prediction of the physical behaviour

of systems, including systems where Newtonian mechanics fails. Even

general relativity is limited—in ways quantum mechanics is not—for

describing systems at the atomic scale or smaller, at very low or very

high energies, or at the lowest temperatures. Through a century of

experimentation and applied science, quantum mechanical theory has

proven to be very successful and practical.

Planck's constant
Classical physics predicted that a black-body radiator would produce

infinite energy, but that result was not observed in the laboratory. If

black-body radiation was dispersed into a spectrum, then the amount

of energy radiated at various frequencies rose from zero at one end,

peaked at a frequency related to the temperature of the radiating

object, and then fell back to zero. In 1900, Max Planck developed an

empirical equation that could account for the observed energy curves,

but he could not harmonize it with classical theory. He concluded that

the classical laws of physics do not apply on the atomic scale as had

been assumed.
In this theoretical account, Planck allowed all possible frequencies, all

possible wavelengths. However, he restricted the energy that is

delivered. "In classical physics,... the energy of a given oscillator

depends merely on its amplitude, and this amplitude is subject to no

restriction." But, according to Planck's theory, the energy emitted by

an oscillator is strictly proportional to its frequency. The higher the

frequency, the greater the energy. To reach this theoretical

conclusion, he postulated that a radiating body consisted of an

enormous number of elementary oscillators, some vibrating at one

frequency and some at another, with all frequencies from zero to

infinity being represented. The energy E of any one oscillator was not

permitted to take on any arbitrary value, but was proportional to some

integral multiple of the frequency f of the oscillator. That is,

where n =1, 2, 3,... The proportionality constant h is called Planck's

constant.

One of the most direct applications is finding the energy of photons.

If you know h, and you know the frequency of the photon, then you can

calculate the energy of the photons. For instance, if a beam of light

illuminated a target, and the light frequency was 540 × 1012 hertz,

then the energy of each photon would be h × 540 × 1012 joules. The

value of h itself is exceedingly small, about 6.6260693 × 10-34 joule

seconds. This means that the photons in the beam of light have an

energy of about 3.58 × 10-19 joules or approximately 2.23 eV.

When you describe the energy of a wave in this manner, it seems that

the wave is carrying its energy in a certain number of little packets

per second. This discovery then seemed to remake the wave into a

particle. These packets of energy carried along with the wave were

called quanta by Planck. Quantum mechanics began with the discovery

that energy is delivered in packets whose size is related to the

frequencies of all electromagnetic waves (and to the color of visible

light since in that case frequency determines color). Be aware,

however, that these descriptions in terms of wave and particle import

macro-world concepts into the quantum world, where they have only

provisional relevance or appropriateness.

In early research on light, there were two competing ways to describe

light, either as a wave propagated through empty space, or as small

particles traveling in straight lines. Because Planck showed that the

energy of the wave is made up of packets, the particle analogy became

favored to help understand how light delivers energy in multiples of

certain set values designated as quanta of energy. Nevertheless, the

wave analogy is also indispensable for helping to understand other light

phenomena. In 1905, Albert Einstein used Planck's constant to

postulate that the energy in a beam of light occurs in concentrations

that he called photons. According to that account, a single photon of a

given frequency delivers an invariant amount of energy. In other

words, individual photons can deliver more or less energy, but only

depending on their frequencies. Although the description that

stemmed from Planck's research sounds like Newton's corpuscular

account, Einstein's photon was still said to have a frequency, and the

energy of the photon was accounted proportional to that frequency.

The particle account had been compromised once again.

Both the idea of a wave and the idea of a particle are models derived

from our everyday experience. We cannot see individual photons. We

can only investigate their properties indirectly. We look at some

phenomena, such as the rainbow of colors that we see when a thin film

of oil rests on the surface of a puddle of water, and we can explain

that phenomenon to ourselves by comparing light with waves. We look

at other phenomena, such as the way a photoelectric meter in our

camera works, and we explain it by analogy to particles colliding with

the detection screen in the meter. In both cases we take concepts

from our everyday experience and apply them to a world we have never

seen.

Neither form of explanation is entirely satisfactory. In general any

model can only approximate that which it models. A model is useful only

within the range of conditions where it is able to predict the real thing

with accuracy. Newtonian physics is still a good predictor of many of

the phenomena in our everyday life. To remind us that both "wave" and

"particle" are concepts imported from our macro world to explain the

world of atomic-scale phenomena, some physicists such as George

Gamow have used the term "wavicle" to refer to whatever it is that is

really there. In the following discussion, "wave" and "particle" may

both be used depending on which aspect of quantum mechanical

phenomena is under discussion.

Bohr atom

The Bohr model of the atom, showing electron quantum jumping to

ground state n=1

In 1897 the particle called the electron was discovered. By means of

the gold foil experiment physicists discovered that matter is, volume

for volume, largely space. Once that was clear, it was hypothesized

that negative charge entities called electrons surround positively

charged nuclei. So at first all scientists believed that the atom must

be like a miniature solar system. But that simple analogy predicted

that electrons would, within about one hundredth of a microsecond,

crash into the nucleus of the atom. The great question of the early
20th century was, "Why do electrons normally maintain a stable orbit

around the nucleus?"

In 1913, Niels Bohr removed this substantial problem by applying the

idea of discrete (non-continuous) quanta to the orbits of electrons.

This account became known as the Bohr model of the atom. Bohr

basically theorized that electrons can only inhabit certain orbits

around the atom. These orbits could be derived by looking at the

spectral lines produced by atoms.

Bohr explained the orbits that electrons can take by relating the

angular momentum of electrons in each "permitted" orbit to the value

of h, Planck's constant. He held that an electron in the lowest orbital

has an angular momentum equal to h/2π. Each orbit after the initial

orbit must provide for an electron's angular momentum being an

integer multiple of that lowest value. He depicted electrons in atoms

as being analogous to planets in a solar orbit. However, he took

Planck's constant to be a fundamental quantity that introduces special

requirements at this subatomic level and that explains the spacing of

those "planetary" orbits.

Bohr considered one revolution in orbit to be equivalent to one cycle in

an oscillator (as in Planck's initial measurements to define the constant

h) which is in turn similar to one cycle in a wave. The number of

revolutions per second is (or defines) what we call the frequency of

that electron or that orbital. Specifying that the frequency of each

orbit must be an integer multiple of Planck's constant h would only

permit certain orbits, and would also fix their size.

Bohr generalized Balmer's formula for hydrogen by replacing

denominator in the term 1/4 with an explicit squared variable:

m=1,2,3,4,5,..., and n > m

where λ is the wavelength of the light and RH is the Rydberg constant

for hydrogen. This generalization predicted many more line spectra

than had been previously detected, and experimental confirmation of

this prediction followed.

It follows almost immediately that if λ is quantized as the formula

above indicates, then the momentum of any photon must be quantized.

The frequency of light, ν, at a given wavelength λ is given by the

relationship

and : and multiplying by h/h = 1,

, and we know that

E = hν so which we can rewrite as:

, and E/c = p (momentum) so

or

Beginning with line spectra, physicists were able to deduce empirically

the rules according to which the orbits of electrons are determined

and to discover something vital about the momentums involved--that

they are quantized.

Bohr next realized how the angular momentum of an electron in its

orbit, L, is quantized, i.e., he determined that there is some constant

value K such that when it is multiplied by Planck’s constant, h, it will

yield the angular momentum that pertains to the lowest orbital. When

it is multiplied by successive integers it will then give the values of

other possible orbitals. He later determined that K = 1/2π .

Bohr's theory represented electrons as orbiting the nucleus of an

atom in a way that was amazingly different from what we see in the

world of our everyday experience. He showed that when an electron

changed orbits it did not move in a continuous trajectory from one

orbit around the nucleus to another. Instead, it suddenly disappeared

from its original orbit and reappeared in another orbit. Each distance

at which an electron can orbit is a function of a quantized amount of

energy. The closer to the nucleus an electron orbits, the less energy it

takes to remain in that orbital. Electrons that absorb a photon gain a

quantum of energy, so they jump to an orbit that is farther from the

nucleus, while electrons that emit a photon lose a quantum of energy

and so jump to an inner orbital. Electrons cannot gain or lose a

fractional quantum of energy, and so, it is argued, they cannot have a

position that is at a fractional distance between allowed orbitals.

Allowed orbitals were designated as whole numbers using the letter n

with the innermost orbital being designated n = 1, the next out being n

= 2, and so on. Any orbital with the same value of n is called an

electron shell.

Bohr's model of the atom was essentially two-dimensional because it

depicts electrons as particles in circular orbits. In this context, two-

dimensional means something that can be described on the surface of

a plane. One-dimensional means something that can be described by a

line. Because circles can be described by their radius, which is a line

segment, sometimes Bohr's model of the atom is described as one-

dimensional.

Wave-particle duality

Niels Bohr determined that it is impossible to describe light

adequately by the sole use of either the wave analogy or of the

particle analogy. Therefore he enunciated the principle of

complementarity, which is a theory of pairs, such as the pairing of

wave and particle or the pairing of position and momentum. Louis de

Broglie worked out the mathematical consequences of these findings.

In quantum mechanics, it was found that electromagnetic waves could

react in certain experiments as though they were particles and in

other experiments as though they were waves. It was also discovered

that subatomic particles could sometimes be described as particles

and sometimes as waves. This discovery led to the theory of wave-

particle duality by Louis-Victor de Broglie in 1924, which states that

subatomic entities have properties of both waves and particles at the

same time.

The Bohr atom model was enlarged upon with the discovery by de

Broglie that the electron has wave-like properties. In accord with de

Broglie's conclusions, electrons can only appear under conditions that

permit a standing wave. A standing wave can be made if a string is

fixed on both ends and made to vibrate (as it would in a stringed

instrument). That illustration shows that the only standing waves that

can occur are those with zero amplitude at the two fixed ends. The

waves created by a stringed instrument appear to oscillate in place,

simply changing crest for trough in an up-and-down motion. A standing

wave can only be formed when the wave's length fits the available
vibrating entity. In other words, no partial fragments of wave crests

or troughs are allowed. In a round vibrating medium, the wave must be

a continuous formation of crests and troughs all around the circle.

Each electron must be its own standing wave in its own discrete

orbital.

The Pauli exclusion principle

There was a doublet, meaning a pair of lines, in the spectrum of a

hydrogen atom that was unaccounted for. This meant that there was

more energy in the electron orbital from magnetic moment than had

previously been described. Wolfgang Pauli, when studying alkali metals,

had introduced what he called a "two-valued quantum degree of

freedom" associated with the electron in the outermost shell.

"Degrees of freedom" simply means the number of possible

independent ways a particle may move. This led to the Pauli Exclusion

Principle, which predicted that no more than two electrons can inhabit

the same orbital. It also predicted that any neutron, electron, or

proton (types of fermions) could not exist in the same quantum state

within an atom. In early 1925, the young physicists Uhlenbeck and

Goudsmit introduced a theory that the electron rotates in space in the

same way that the earth rotates on its axis. This would account for

the missing magnetic moment and allow for two electrons in the same
orbital to be different if their spin was in opposite directions to each

other, thus satisfying the Exclusion Principle. probability distribution

of the electron further defining the number of cells in its phase space.

The minimum limit is the limit of the Uncertainty Principle and the

Exclusion Principle states that no two electrons can be within this

same minimum space defined by the Uncertainty Principle. Therefore,

a single electron in its orbital when defined by its quantum state which

is its wavefunction which is defined by its four quantum numbers

cannot have the same four quantum numbers of another electron in

that atom. Where two electrons are in the same n-sphere and

therefore share the same principal quantum number, they must then

have some other unique quantum number of shape l, magnetic moment

m or spin s. Even in the formation of degenerate gases where the

electrons are not in an orbital around the nucleus of an atom, they

must still follow the Pauli Exclusion Principle when in a confined space.