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Elements – different types of atom
Elements are the simplest substances. There are about
100 different elements.
Each element is made up of very tiny particles called atoms,
and each element is made up of just one particular type of
atom, which is different to the atoms in any other element.

Gold is an element
made up of only
gold atoms.

Carbon is an element
made up of only
carbon atoms.

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Atoms – the building blocks
John Dalton had the first
ideas about the existence of
atoms over 200 years ago.
However, it is only relatively
recently that special
microscopes (called electron
microscopes) been invented
that can actually ‘see’ atoms.
This image is highly magnified.
What could it be showing?
The yellow blobs are individual
gold atoms, as seen through
an electron microscope.

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How small is an atom?
Atoms are very small – they are about 0.00000001 cm wide.
Think about the thickness
of a crisp.
The number of atoms you
would need to stack up to
make the thickness of a
crisp, is approximately
the same number of
crisps you would need to
stack up to make the
height of Mount Everest!
That’s roughly 7 million
crisps!

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What are atoms made of?

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What particles are atoms made of?
For some time, people thought that atoms were the
smallest particles and could not be broken into anything
smaller.
Scientists now know that atoms are actually made from
even smaller particles. There are three types:

proton neutron electron

How are these particles arranged inside the atom?

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What is the structure of an atom?
Protons, neutrons and electrons are not evenly distributed
in an atom.

The protons and neutrons

exist in a dense core at the
centre of the atom. This is
called the nucleus.

The electrons are

spread out around the
edge of the atom. They
orbit the nucleus in
layers called shells.

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Labelling the atom

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How was atomic structure discovered?

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Mass and electrical charge
There are two properties of protons, neutrons and electrons
that are especially important:
 mass
 electrical charge.

Particle Mass Charge

proton 1 +1
neutron 1 0
electron almost 0 -1

The atoms of an element contain equal numbers of protons

and electrons and so have no overall charge.

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Properties of the particles of the atom

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How many protons?
The atoms of any particular element always contain the
same number of protons. For example:
 hydrogen atoms always contain 1 proton
 carbon atoms always contain 6 protons
 magnesium atoms always contain 12 protons.

The number of protons in an atom

is known as the atomic number
or proton number.

It is the smaller of the two numbers

shown in most periodic tables.

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What is the atomic number?
What are the atomic numbers of these elements?

sodium 11

iron 26

tin 50

fluorine 9

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More about atomic number
Each element has a definite and fixed number of protons.
If the number of protons changes, then the atom becomes
a different element.
Changes in the number of particles
in the nucleus (protons or neutrons)
are very rare. They only take place
in nuclear processes such as:
 radioactive decay
 nuclear bombs
 nuclear reactors.

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What is mass number?
Electrons have a mass of almost zero, which means that the
mass of each atom results almost entirely from the number
of protons and neutrons in the nucleus.

The sum of the protons and neutrons

in an atom’s nucleus is the mass number.
It is the larger of the two numbers shown
in most periodic tables.

Mass
Atoms Protons Neutrons number

hydrogen 1 0 1
lithium 3 4 7
aluminium 13 14 27

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 What’s the mass number?

mass number = number of protons + number of neutrons

What is the mass number of these atoms?

Mass
Atoms Protons Neutrons number

helium 2 2 4
copper 29 35 64
cobalt 27 32 59

iodine 53 74 127
germanium 32 41 73

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 How many neutrons?

number of neutrons = mass number - number of protons

= mass number - atomic number

How many neutrons are there in these atoms?

Atoms Mass number Atomic number Neutrons

helium 4 2 2
fluorine 19 9 10
strontium 88 38 50

zirconium 91 40 51
uranium 238 92 146

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Building a nucleus

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How many electrons?
Atoms have no overall electrical charge and are neutral.

This means atoms must have an equal number of positive

protons and negative electrons.

The number Atoms Protons Neutrons Electrons

of electrons
is therefore helium 2 2 2
the same as copper 29 35 29
the atomic
number. iodine 53 74 53

Atomic number is the number of protons rather than the

number of electrons, because atoms can lose or gain
electrons but do not normally lose or gain protons.

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What are the missing numbers?

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Atoms: true of false?

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How are atoms arranged?
Where are the electrons found in the atom?

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How are electrons arranged?
Electrons are not evenly spread but exist in layers called
shells. (The shells can also be called energy levels).
The arrangement of electrons in these shells is often
called the electron configuration.

1st shell

2nd shell

3rd shell

Note that this diagram is not drawn to scale – the atom is

mostly empty space. If the electrons are the size shown,
the nucleus would be too small to see.

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How many electrons per shell?
Each shell has a maximum number of electrons that it can
hold. Electrons will fill the shells nearest the nucleus first.
1st shell holds
a maximum of
2 electrons

2nd shell holds

a maximum of
8 electrons

3rd shell holds

a maximum of
8 electrons

This electron arrangement is written as 2,8,8.

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Calculate electron configurations

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Which element?

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Summary: the atom so far
The nucleus is:
 made up of protons and neutrons
 positively charged because of the
protons
 dense – it contains nearly all the
mass of the atom in a tiny space.

Electrons are:
 very small and light, and negatively charged
 able to be lost or gained in chemical reactions
 found thinly spread around the outside of the nucleus,
orbiting in layers called shells.

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Summary: the atom so far

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What is an isotope?
Elements are made up of one type of atom, but there can
be slightly different forms of the atoms in an element.

Although atoms of the same element always have the

same number of protons, they may have different numbers
of neutrons.

Atoms that differ in this way are called isotopes.

For example, two isotopes of carbon:

mass number
is different

atomic number
is the same
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What are the isotopes of carbon?
Most naturally-occurring carbon exists as carbon-12, about
1% is carbon-13 and a much smaller amount is carbon-14.

6 protons 6 protons 6 protons

6 neutrons 7 neutrons 8 neutrons
6 electrons 6 electrons 6 electrons

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Properties of isotopes
The isotopes of an element are virtually identical in their
chemical reactions.

This is because they

have the same
number of protons
and the same
number of electrons.

The uncharged neutrons make little difference to chemical

properties but do affect physical properties such as melting
point and density.

Natural samples of elements are often a mixture of isotopes.

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What are the isotopes of hydrogen?
Hydrogen-1 makes up the vast majority of the naturally-
occurring element but two other isotopes exist.

hydrogen deuterium tritium

1 proton 1 proton 1 proton
0 neutrons 1 neutrons 2 neutrons
1 electron 1 electron 1 electron

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What are the isotopes of chlorine?
About 75% of naturally-occurring chlorine is chlorine-35 and
25% is chlorine-37.
17 protons 17 protons
18 neutrons 20 neutrons
17 electrons 17 electrons

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What are the isotopes of oxygen?
Almost all of naturally-occurring oxygen is oxygen-16,
but about 0.2% is oxygen-18.
What are the particle numbers in each isotope below?
oxygen-16
8 protons
8 neutrons
8 electrons

oxygen-18
8 protons
10 neutrons
8 electrons
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Isotopes – true of false?

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 Glossary (1/2)
atom – The smallest particle that can exist on its own.
atomic number – The number of protons in the nucleus
of an atom, also known as the proton number.

electron – Negatively charged particle that orbits the

nucleus of an atom.

element – A substance made up of only one type of atom.

isotopes – Different atoms of the same element. They

have the same number of protons and electrons, but a
different number of neutrons.

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 Glossary (2/2)
nucleus – The dense, positively charged centre of an
atom, made up of protons and neutrons.

neutron – A neutral particle, with a mass of 1. It is found in

the nucleus of an atom.

mass number – The number of protons and neutrons in

the nucleus of an atom.

proton – A positively particle, with a mass of 1. It is found

in the nucleus of an atom.

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Anagrams

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Summary of atomic structure

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Atomic structure – word check

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Atomic structure – word search

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Multiple-choice quiz

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