The History of Atomic Structure
What is the atomic structure you may ask? Well, it’s the law stating the structure of an atom. It is composed of a positively charged nucleus containing a certain amount of protons (positive), neutrons (neutral charge), and electrons (negative). The amount of each subatomic particle (proton, neutron, and electron) all depend on what the element is. Now although this statement may seem fairly simple it was most definitely not. People have been studying the atomic structure for more than 300+ years and are still studying it. So after reading this you may wonder who even made this atomic structure up. After hundreds of years of research there is not any one individual who made the structure up but roughly
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He stated that this was a mysterious force but never continued his research on it. Then in 460 B.C. there was a philosopher named Democritus. Democritus and his mentor Leocippus posed the question that if he broke bread into multiple pieces how many would breaks would it take until there was no more bread. He then was able to make a few theories being all matter was created of atoms and atoms are solid but not invisible. However, there was a man named Aristotle and many other philosophers who disagreed with Democritus and said matter was composed of four main elements. Earth, fire, air, and water. For example, a liquid was made of water and a stone was made of rock. Therefore, Democritus’s theory “ was rejected by Aristotle, one of the most influential philosophers of Ancient Greece; and the atomic theory was ignored for nearly 2,000 years.”( The second main contributor toward the atomic structure was John Dalton. John Dalton was the one who brought the atomic theory talk back into play after 2000 years from Democritus. Dalton become fond of the atomic structure following his love from meteorology. He claimed that the forces of repulsion that caused pressure only were between the same atoms and the atoms inside a mixture had different weights and complexity. He then decided to calculate the atomic weights by determining the percentages of each composition in a compound. This allowed him to be able to
Around 2,500 years ago, Democritus and his partner Leucippus were the first ones to develop the atomic theory in written history. Their theory proposed that every kind of matter was made up of tiny particles, which were named atomos, which means that it is indivisible. This meant that Democritus and Leucippus thought there were little particles of everything, but, the next breakthrough in atomic theory wasn’t made until the early 1800s with a french chemist by the name of Antoine Lavoisier, he was the one who came up with the idea of the law of the conservation of mass, which states that matter stays the same even when it changes shape or form. Then, James Dalton said that all matter was made up of atoms, which were indivisible, and unbreakable.
Around 1803 John Dalton, an English chemist developed the first useful atomic theory of matter. Amedeo Avogadro, the Italian chemist in 1811 published an article drawing the distinction between the atom and the molecule, which now is known as “Avogadro’s
Throughout history the periodic table of elements has been influenced and amended by multiple scientists. These scientists include Johann Dobereiner, A.E Beguyer de Chancourtois, John Newlands, and Glenn Seaborg. As well as Dmitri Ivanovich Mendeleev and Lothar Meyer the creators of the periodic table. There are many ways that the periodic table of elements was set out. For example the table can be organized using patterns between atomic numbers, electronegativity, ionization energy, structure (gas or solid) valence electrons and electron configuration (shells) as seen in the modern day periodic table.
Atomic Theories 1. John Dalton John Dalton based his theory on Democritus’ findings. This was that matter could be divided and split into several smaller “units”, eventually forming a tiny particle that couldn’t be divided. This particle is an atom. Democritus and other Ancient Greeks could not support their theory or findings due to the lack of technology, equipment and understanding of atoms.
Ernest Rutherford proposed in 1911 the atom as consisting of a core called nucleus, consisting of heavy protons surrounded by electrons. For the atomic bomb, it is only necessary to consider the nucleus. Around the same time, Neils Bohr and others developed quantum mechanics that deepened our understanding of the atom.
“Energy levels in Atoms exist all over the world. Some atoms consist of protons and neutrons making up a nucleus; they are surrounded by electrons. Rutherford made designs and conclusions to develop his nuclear atomic model. Although Rutherford’s model couldn’t explain other properties of elements, such as why metals or compounds of metals give off colors when the flame is heated” (Wilbraham et al 136). John Dalton. (Early nineteenth century) He combined an idea of elements with the earlier theory of atoms. He had the following ideas about matter: (1) matter is made up of atoms. (Wikipedia)
The accidental discovery of this conversion many centuries ago led to the discovery of the first synthetic phosphor.[4] The sulfide, unlike the sulfate, is water-soluble. Sometime prior to the autumn of 1803, the Englishman John Dalton was able to explain the results of some of his studies by assuming that matter is composed of atoms and that all samples of any given compound consist of the same combination of these atoms. Dalton also noted that in series of compounds, the ratios of the masses of the second element that combine with a given weight of the first element can be reduced to small whole numbers (the law of multiple proportions). This was further evidence for atoms. Dalton's theory of atoms was published by Thomas Thomson in the 3rd edition of his System of Chemistry in 1807 and in a paper about strontium oxalates published in the Philosophical Transactions. Dalton published these ideas himself in the following year in the New System of Chemical
The Discovery of the Atom first came from the Greeks which made a theory “The idea that all matter is made up of tiny, indivisible particles, or atoms, is believed to have originated with the Greek philosopher Leucippus of Miletus and his student Democritus of Abdera in the 5th century B.C. (The word atom comes from the Greek word atomos, which means “indivisible.”)” (InfoPlease Atomic theory)
Atomic theory is the theory that all matter is made up of tiny indivisible particles called atoms. This paper will discuss its beginnings and some of the scientists who made major contributions to how it is defined today.
The German chemist, named Dobereiner, in 1829 noted some of the first elemental similarities. His observations began with bromine, which had just been discovered. He noticed that the properties of bromine were similar to chlorine and iodine. Not only were they related but also various properties of bromine, including the atomic weight, fell midway between the properties of chlorine and iodine, but also there was a pattern within the group of regularly increasing atomic weights. As he did his research he noticed a couple other groups of elements with patterns
What part of the Atomic Theory did they investigate? Ernest Rutherford was responsible for a many different discoveries such as radioactivity and nuclear physics. He discovered alpha and beta rays, found the laws of radioactive decay, and identified alpha particles as helium nuclei. Most important, he postulated the nuclear structure of the atom this structure was known as Rutherford model. Rutherford overturned Thomson 's model in 1911 with his well-known gold foil experiment in which he demonstrated that the atom has a tiny, heavy nucleus. Rutherford designed an experiment to use the alpha particles emitted by a radioactive element as probes to the unseen world of atomic structure. Ernest Rutherford publishes his atomic theory describing the atom as having a central positive nucleus surrounded by negative orbiting electrons. This model suggested that most of the mass of the atom was contained in the small nucleus, and that the rest of the atom was mostly empty space.
In ancient Greece, the first philosophers searched for the fundamental building blocks of the world. Originally, it was thought that the fundamental elements were earth, air, fire, and water. Empedocles (c. 490-430 BC) was the first to classify the elements and propose that they made up everything in our world in different combinations. Leucippus (c. 460-370 BC), and his student Democritus (c. 460-370 BC), were the first to propose a theory that the world was made up of “atoms.” The word “atom” is derived from the Greek word “atomon,” which means “that which cannot be divided” (The Particle Adventure). Leucippus’s theory was very vague. He claimed the world was made of two elements that he called, “the full” or the “solid” and “the empty” or “void” (Berryman). He believed these particles were infinite and were what made up all things. Because Leucippus’s
John Dalton studied and expanded upon this previous work and developed the law of multiple proportions: if two elements can be combined to form a number of possible compounds, then the ratios of the masses of the second element which combine with a fixed mass of the first element will be ratios of small whole numbers. For example: Proust had studied tin oxides and found that
The atomic theory is a fundamental scientific theory of the nature of matter, which states that matter is composed of discrete units called atoms, which came from the Greek word atomon, meaning ‘uncuttable’. This theory was based on the concept that any given item in the universe could be broken down using pico- and femtometer atomic/subatomic/alpha particles. If this idea had never been composed, science would have suffered as a result and many scientists would not have been known for their raison d’etre’s.