John Dalton

The Physicist, Meteorologist, and Chemist

By Benito, Hernan, Eva, Fabian and Willah

Five main points of Dalton's atomic theory

Elements are made from extremely small particles called atoms. Atoms of a given element are identical in size, mass, and other properties; atoms of different elements differ in size, mass,and other properties. Atoms cannot be subdivided, created, or destroyed. Atoms of different elements combine in simple whole-number ratios to form chemical compounds.

In chemical reactions, atoms are combined, separated, or rearranged.

Dalton's Law of Definite Composition

This law states that: A compound always contains two or more elements combined in a definite proportion by mass, OR all samples of a given chemical compound have the same elemental composition by mass

Dalton's Law of Multiple Proportions

The idea developed around 1804. Later verified and made public in 1807. EX: 100g of carbon may react with 133g of oxygen to form oxide #1, or with 266g of oxygen to form oxide #2. The ratio is 266:133, which is apprx. 2:1

If two elements form multiple compounds, the masses of the second elements and the fixed masses of the first elements combined will be a ratio of small whole numbers

Atomic Symbols

John Dalton's atomic symbols and their elements

John Dalton was the first person to start using symbols to represent the elements He began with a chart of 21 elements, arranged by atomic weight, and eventually came up with 15 more symbols (36 total) Dalton's symbols were based in English though, and later the scientist Jns Jakob Berzelius changed the symbols to Latin abbreviations

Law of Definite Proportions

This law states that a chemical compound always contains exactly the same proportion of elements by mass. John Dalton's theory: that there is one atom for each element,

and that compounds were made of combinations of different kinds of atoms in fixed proportions. this created a strong theoretical basis for this law.