THE PARTICLES OF MATTER (PART I): ATOMS

The Nature of the Particles of Matter

So far we have talked about “particles”. Evidently, the particles forming water must be
different to the particles of iron or sugar. There are millions of different particles (as
many as different substances). To begin with, particles can be sorted into three different
classes: atoms, molecules and ions.

Atoms: electrically balanced particles that consist in one positively charged centre
called the nucleus surrounded by a “cloud” of negatively charged particles called the
electrons, to exactly balance the nuclear charge.
Molecules: electrically balanced particles with more than one positive centres (nuclei).
Molecules are sets of bonded atoms that act as a unit.
Ions: atoms (or groups of atoms) with unbalanced charges
As it can be appreciated, atoms seem to be the essential particles for any kind of matter.
They were thought to be the simplest possible particles, with no possibility of having
“parts” or being broken. We will learn how these ideas have changed during the past
200 years.

Dalton's Atomic Theory

               
It was in the early 1800s that John Dalton came up with his atomic theory. The idea of
atoms had been proposed much earlier. The ancient Greek philosophers had talked
about atoms, but Dalton's theory was different in that it was supported by careful
chemical measurements behind it. Up to this moment, Democritus’ ideas have been
tacitly accepted by Galileo, Newton, Boyle and other scientists, but Dalton’s theory
relied on experimental facts: it wasn't just a philosophical statement that there are atoms
because there must be atoms.

Less than twenty years earlier, in the 1780's, Lavoisier had started a new chemical era
by making careful quantitative measurements which allowed the compositions of
compounds to be determined with accuracy. He established that matter cannot be
created or destroyed during a chemical change (the Law of Conservation of Mass). By
1799 enough data had been accumulated for Proust to establish the Law of Constant
Composition: when elements combine to form a compound they do it always in the
same proportion. In 1803 Dalton noted that oxygen and carbon combined to make two
compounds one had exactly twice as much oxygen as the other. This fact of elements
combining in definite amounts was proved to hold in many other cases. In an attempt to
explain how and why elements would combine with one another in fixed ratios and
sometimes also in multiples of those ratios, Dalton formulated his atomic theory.

1
This theory stated that elements consisted of tiny particles called atoms. He said that
the reason an element is pure is because all atoms of an element were identical and
that in particular they had the same mass. Atoms of an element could not be created,
destroyed or divided. He also said that the reason elements differed from one another
was that atoms of each element were different from one another; in particular, they
had different masses. He also said that compounds consisted of atoms of different
elements combined together.

Dalton’s theory was not compatible with some experimental results of Gay-Lussac’s so
it had to be modified. Avogadro did that admitting Dalton’s ideas but with a slight
change: he hypothesised that the elements are not formed by atoms but rather by sets of
equal atoms stuck together. He called this new entity a molecule. So although atoms
are the ultimate particles involved in chemical reactions, the physically separated
particles in a gas are the molecules. Previous to Avogadro’s assumptions it was
admitted that the number of particles (atoms) in say 1 dm3 of any gaseous element
was the same (provided temperature and pressure were the same for both).
According to Avogadro’s ideas this still holds but the number of particles is not the
number of atoms but the number of molecules.

The First Atomic Model: Thomson’s “Plum Pudding”

The next great step forward in the understanding of atoms was accomplished by John
Thomson. Using a cathode ray tube, Thomson determined that all matter, whatever its
source, contains particles of the same kind that are much less massive than the
atoms of which they form a part. They are now called electrons, although he
originally called them corpuscles.
His discovery was the result of an attempt to solve a long-standing controversy
regarding the nature of cathode rays, which occur when an electric current is driven
through a vessel from which most of the air or other gas has been pumped out.

Thomson was able to put forward a

convincing argument that these rays were
composed of particles. Furthermore, these rays
seemed to be composed of the same particles,
or corpuscles, regardless of what kind of gas
carried the electric discharge or what kinds of
metals were used as conductors. From these

2
ideas he developed the idea that atoms are made of negative electrons embedded in a gel
of positive charge (a "plum pudding" model).

Rutherford’s Planetary Model

Rutherford overturned Thomson's atom model in 1911 with

his “gold foil” experiment. Rutherford used alpha particles
emitted by a radioactive element as atomic bullets to probe
the unseen world of atomic structure.
He beamed them through the foil and detected them as
flashes of light or scintillations on a screen. The gold foil was
only a few hundreds of atoms thick.

If the Thomson model of atoms was correct, then

the alpha particles should pass through with some
deflection (bending) in their paths and they will
strike the fluorescent screen behind the foil. What
happened was absolutely different. Most alpha
particles were observed to pass straight through as
if there were no atoms at all (empty space). But a
few were scattered at very large angles, even
bouncing back toward the source

Results can best explained by a model for the

atom as a tiny, very dense, positively charged core called a nucleus, around which the
light negative electrons, circulate at some distance, much like planets revolving around
the Sun. That’s why the Rutherford atomic model has been alternatively called the
nuclear atom, or the planetary model of the atom.

Bohr’s electron shells

A spinning electron should produce EM radiation

(light) according to the laws of electromagnetism.
Consequently it would lose energy and spiral into
nucleus, crashing against it, i.e. atoms should be very
unstable and could not exist. Classical physics fails to
describe the properties of atoms. To explain this and
other experimental facts (too complicated to explain
briefly) Bohr proposed a shell model for the atom using
the same basic structure as Rutherford, but restricting
the location of electrons to definite zones with specific
energies and at definite distances from it.

The electrons in the shells do not behave as tiny balls spinning around the nucleus but
rather as bubbles or onion skins. The first shell holds just up to 2 electrons, the second
and third up to 8 electrons. For the sake of clarity they are represented as dots.

3
The Atomic Nucleus

By the time of Thomson’s discovery of the electron, Goldstein found in a related set of
experiments rays formed by streams of positive particles. He supposed they were the
remains of atoms as you strip some electrons from them. Later, Rutherford, who was
still bombarding matter with alpha particles, found that if he beamed nitrogen particles
with them, some hydrogen nuclei (hydrogen is the lightest atom) were formed. He
checked this with other particles and concluded that complex nuclei were formed by the
aggregation of hydrogen nuclei. He called this particle a proton (protos=first one).
Now, what keeps protons stuck together if they strongly repel each other because of
their charges being equal?
This was not clearly established until 1932 when Chadwick detected a particle with no
charge and practically the same mass of the proton. He named this particle a neutron.
Neutrons are the cementing stuff in the nucleus. The force between protons and
neutrons is called the strong nuclear interaction. It is attractive and some 100 fold
stronger that electric repulsion

The sub-atomic particles

The following chart summarises the essential facts about the particles in the atom

relative mass relative charge

proton 1 +1
neutron 1 0
electron 1/1836 -1

The nucleus is at the centre of the atom and contains the protons and neutrons. Protons
and neutrons are collectively known as nucleons.
Virtually all the mass of the atom is concentrated in the nucleus, because the electrons
weigh so little.

Atomic and Mass Numbers

Nr of protons = ATOMIC NUMBER of the atom ( Z )

The atomic number is also given the more descriptive name of proton number.
The number of protons will determine the number of electrons necessary to balance the
atom’s charge.
Nr of protons + Nr of neutrons = MASS NUMBER of the atom ( A )
The mass number is also called the nucleon number.

This information can be given simply this way →

How many protons and neutrons has this atom got?

The atomic number counts the number of protons (9); the mass number counts protons
+ neutrons (19). If there are 9 protons, there must be 10 neutrons for the total to add up
to 19.
A question arises: what is the meaning of the “F” in the figure? To answer this question
we must know what an element is.

4
 Elements

An element is formed by all the nuclei that have the same number of protons.

Elements show distinct chemical and physical properties and are given different names
and symbols. There are 92 different stable natural elements: the lightest element (Z = 1)
is hydrogen and the heaviest (Z= 92) is uranium. Scientists have synthesised some 20
trans-uranic elements but they are unstable and decay to lighter atoms. The following
table shows the names and the symbols of the first 20 elements. You must recall these
symbols but not the order of the elements.

Z Name Symbol Z Name Symbol Z Name Symbol Z Name Symbol

1 Hydrogen H 2 Helium He 3 Lithium Li 4 Beryllium Be
5 Boron B 6 Carbon C 7 Nitrogen N 8 Oxygen O
9 Fluorine F 10 Neon Ne 11 Sodium Na 12 Magnesium Mg
13 Aluminium Al 14 Silicon Si 15 Phosphorus P 16 Sulphur S
17 Chlorine Cl 18 Argon A 19 Potassium K 20 Calcium Ca

The atomic number is tied to the position of the element in the Periodic Table (the
system used by chemists to classify atoms) and therefore the number of protons defines
what sort of element you are talking about. So if an atom has 8 protons (atomic number
= 8), it must be oxygen. If an atom has 12 protons (atomic number = 12), it must be
magnesium.
Similarly, every chlorine atom (atomic number = 17) has 17 protons; every uranium
atom (atomic number = 92) has 92 protons.

Atomic properties that depend on the nucleus

Three properties of the atoms depend on their nuclei:

• Stability: not all possible nuclei exist. As the number of nucleons increase they
become more and more unstable and break down into pieces or emit particles
until they get to an adequate number of neutrons and protons. This is called
radioactivity. Moreover, the ratio between neutrons and protons is restricted to
certain values to render the nucleus stable.
• Mass: electrons are about 2.000 times less massive than protons and neutrons.
Thus, the total mass of the electrons can be neglected and the mass of an atom
depends completely on its nucleus.
• Number of electrons around the nucleus: atoms are particles with balanced
charges and they have as many electrons as protons in the nucleus to achieve
neutrality.

The Electrons

Atoms are electrically “neutral”, and the positive charge of the protons is balanced by
the negative charge of the electrons. It follows that in an atom:
Nr of electrons = Nr of protons
So, if an oxygen atom (atomic number = 8) has 8 protons, it must also have 8 electrons;
if a chlorine atom (atomic number = 17) has 17 protons, it must also have 17 electrons.

5
The arrangement of the electrons

As we have studied before, the electrons are found at considerable distances from the
nucleus in a series of energy levels also called shells. Each energy level (shell) can
only hold a certain number of electrons. The first level (nearest the nucleus) will only
hold 2 electrons, the second up to 8, and the third also seems to be full when it has 8
electrons.
These shells or levels can be thought of, as getting progressively further from the
nucleus. Electrons will always go into the lowest possible energy level (nearest the
nucleus) - provided the level is not full.

Atomic properties that depend on the electron cloud

Two properties of the atom depend on their electrons:

• Size: the volume of an atom does not depend on the nucleus that is a small dot in
the centre of it. The electrons around the nucleus and reaching at different
distances according to the shells they occupy are responsible of giving the atom
a volume, a region in space of its own where other atoms cannot penetrate
because of the electron-to-electron repulsion.
• Chemical properties: as we will see later, the arrangement of the electrons and
in particular their number in the outer shell determines an atom’s behaviour
towards other atoms. In a vast number of situations chemistry is just about
describing what happens at the atoms’ outer shells.

The Periodic Table

Classification criterion

The periodic table is a chart where scientists have arranged the elements according
to their increasing proton or atomic number Z. It was first proposed by Dimitri
Mendelejeff around the 1860’s although he actually used the mass number as a
classification criterion. He stated that if elements were arranged according to increasing
atomic masses, chemical and physical similarities would appear every eight elements.
Following this, elements should form eight columns or groups, divided in sub-groups.
Each row of eight members was called a period. He had to allow for some oddities that
could not be clearly explained by his time (atoms were supposed to be kind of balls with
no internal structure and nobody suspected the existence of protons, electrons etc.) so
many scientists didn’t quite agree with him. Further advances suggested that the
classification should be based on the number of charges of the nuclei rather than their
masses (Moseley’s law), and finally the groups were separated in different blocks.

Current aspect of the Periodic Table

The current shape of the Periodic Table is shown below this paragraph. All elements in
the same column belong to the same group and have similar behaviour. These properties
vary “smoothly” from group to group. The first two columns are called the reactive
metals. The rest of the pink elements are all metals too. They are classified as the
transition, poor and rare earth metals. The yellow elements are the non metals. The
elements in the last column (usually included in this set) are called the noble gases
(because of their low to almost none reactivity they show as noble metals do). The

6
metals as they appear as pure substances are all good conductors of electricity and heat,
malleable, ductile, sonorous, form high melting point solid oxides with oxygen. All but
three of them are solid at room temperature and most are hard and very dense. The non
metals are poor conductors of heat and electricity (except for a form of carbon called
graphite), half of them are gaseous, one is liquid and the rest are dull, brittle solids.
Their oxides, if solid, have low melting points. The pale green zigzagging set between
metals are non metals share properties with both main groupings. They are sometimes
called the semi-metals. Hydrogen poses a problem because despite having one electron
in its outer shell (group I) it is a typical non metal (a non conducting, light gas that
bonds to non metals covalently (see later)). Its special behaviour is due to the fact that
loosing its outer shell electron as other metals do, will form … a loose proton! So this
doesn’t normally happen.

Group and period numbers

In the table shown groups are numbered from 1 to 18. In many tables the “tall” groups
are numbered from 1A to 7A , the noble gases belonging either to group 8A or 0. The
“short” groups are numbered starting at 3B (headed by Sc) to 8B (Warning!! Group 8B
has three columns headed by Fe, Co and Ni) and ending with Zn in group 2B (there are
historical reasons for this messy numbering). Periods are numbered from 1 (the H
period, a very short period indeed with just two members) to 7. Elements past uranium
are all man-made elements: all of them are unstable and break down with half lives
sometimes as short as milliseconds or less.

If you look at the patterns in this table:

• The number of electrons in the outer level is the same as the group number.
(Except for helium which has only 2 electrons).
• This pattern extends throughout the Periodic Table for the main or “tall” groups
(i.e. not including the transition elements). So if you know that barium is in
group 2, it has 2 electrons in its outer level; iodine (group 7) has 7 electrons in
its outer level; lead (group 4) has 4 electrons in its outer level.
• Noble gases have full outer levels.
• The noble gases are also usually called group 0 - not group 8.
• The number of the period equals the number of shells totally or partially
occupied.

7
To work out the electronic arrangement of an atom knowing its group and period

• Look up the atomic number in the Periodic Table - making sure that you choose
the right number if two numbers are given. The atomic number will always be
the smaller one.
• This tells you the number of protons, and hence the number of electrons.
• Arrange the electrons in levels, always filling up an inner level before you go to
an outer one.

QUESTIONS AND PROBLEMS

1- Name one difference between an atom and an ion and one difference between an
atom and a molecule.
2- List the essential ideas of Dalton’s Atomic Theory.
3- Assume as Dalton that all oxygen atoms have the same mass. The ozone
molecule is formed by three oxygen atoms (O3) and the oxygen molecule just by
two (O2).
a- Which is the heaviest particle?
b- Are there more particles in 10 g of ozone or in 10 g of oxygen?
c- Are there more particles in two litres of ozone or in two litres of oxygen?
(at the same pressure and temperature)
d- Are 5 litres of ozone heavier or lighter than 5 litres of oxygen?(same P &
T)
e- (Bonus) How many litres of oxygen have the same mass as 1 litre of
ozone? (same P & T)
4- In the paragraph about Rutherford’s model a lithium atom is shown as modelled
by him. Draw the lithium atom according to Bohr’s model.
5- Find the number of protons, neutrons and electrons for the following atoms
(values of A and Z are given)
a- A = 40 Z = 18
b- A = 23 Z =11
c- A = 35 Z = 17
d- A = 16 Z = 8
e- A = 28 Z = 14
f- A = 37 Z = 17
g- A = 39 Z = 19
h- A = 19 Z = 9
6- Write the atoms of exercise (5) in order of increasing mass and in order of
increasing nuclear charge.
7- Find the electron configuration (distribution) for the elements of exercise (5)
a- Which belong to the same period?
b- Which belong to the same group?
c- Which are metals, which non metals? Is there any noble gas in the
group?
d- Which belong to the same element?