RUCTURE OF THE ATOM

Matter is anything that has mass and occupies space. Atoms are fundamental building blocks of matter that cannot be further divided by any chemical means. What are elements?

Elements are constituents of matter. There are 92 natural elements. Elements like hydrogen, carbon, nitrogen and oxygen are elements that make up the majority of living things. Other groups of element that exist in living things are: magnesium, calcium, phosphorus, sodium, potassium.

Many elements were discovered before the late 1800’s. A Russian scientist Dmitri Mendeleev then proposed an arrangement of elements based on their atomic masses. In the modern time, elements are no longer arranged based on their atomic masses but according to their atomic numbers.

The word atom is a derivative of the Greek word atom which means undividable. The Greeks came to a conclusion that matter could be further divided into particles that are too tiny to be seen with the naked eye. These tiny indivisible particles of matter were referred to as atoms.

An atom is made up of three types of particles:

• Protons

• Neutrons, and

• Electron
To be continued

(The second part is already on www.globestand.)

I will post them though if I have the time