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Atoms in the Universe
A billion years after the big bang, hydrogen atoms were mysteriously torn apart into a soup of ions.The number of atoms in the entire observable universe is estimated to be within the range of 1078 to...
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Atomic Mass
Stylised Lithium Atom by Halfdan The mass of an atom is its atomic mass (duh!). Actually, it’s worth looking into this a bit more deeply … it’s not as simple as the “duh!” implies … An atom is made up...
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Atomic Structure
Are atoms composed of smaller things? Do atoms have structure? From when Dalton proposed the scientific theory that matter is composed of atoms, at the start of the 19th century, exactly these...
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Atomic Radius
Stylised Lithium Atom by Halfdan If you can imagine an atom, of an element, as a sphere, then the radius of that sphere would be the atomic radius of that element. However, as atoms are things far...
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What Is An Electron
Stylized Lithium Atom by Halfdan What is an electron? Easily put, an electron is a subatomic particle that carries a negative electric charge. There are no known components, so it is believed to be an...
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What Is Atomic Mass
Stylized Lithium Atom by Halfdan The answer to ‘what is atomic mass’ is this: the total mass of the protons, neutrons, and electrons in a single atom when it is at rest. This is not to be associated or...
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Atomic number
Atom model Ever wonder why the periodic table of elements is organized the way it is? Why, for example, does Hydrogen come first? And just what are these numbers that are used to sort them all? They...
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Subatomic Particles
Atom model Not long ago, scientists believed that the smallest part of matter was the atom; the indivisible, indestructible, base unit of all things. However, it was not long before scientists began to...
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How Small Are Atoms?
Here on Universe Today we often discuss things that exist on the atomic and sub-atmonic scale. Even though astronomy is concerned with very big things that happen over very, very large distances and...
View ArticleAstronomy Cast Ep. 335: Photoelectric Effect
Pop quiz. How did Einstein win his Nobel prize? Was it for relativity? Nope, Einstein won the Nobel Prize in 1921 for the discovery of the photoelectric effect; how electrons are emitted from atoms...
View ArticleAstronomy Cast Ep. 378: Rutherford and Atoms
Physicists knew the interior of the atom contained protons, neutrons and electrons, but they didn’t understand exactly how they were organized. It took Ernest Rutherford to uncover our modern...
View ArticleAstronomy Cast Ep. 379: Fermi’s Atom Splitting
When he wasn’t puzzling the mystery of alien civilizations, Enrico Fermi was splitting atoms. He realized that when atoms were split, the neutrons released could go on and split other atoms, creating a...
View ArticleWeekly Space Hangout – Oct 2, 2015: Water on Mars, Blood Moon Eclipses, and...
Host: Fraser Cain (@fcain) Guests: Morgan Rehnberg (cosmicchatter.org / @MorganRehnberg ) Pamela Gay (cosmoquest.org / @cosmoquestx / @starstryder) Kimberly Cartier (@AstroKimCartier ) Brian Koberlein...
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Will Minds Appear in the Cosmos?
This is a video – you should watch it! One of the interesting consequences of quantum theory is that particles can randomly appear in the cosmos, and if you wait long enough, conscious minds and maybe...
View ArticleAstronomy Cast Ep. 392: The Standard Model – Intro
Humans, cars and planets are made of molecules. And molecules are made of atoms. Atoms are made of protons, neutrons and electrons. What are they made of? This is the standard model of particle...
View ArticleAstronomy Cast Ep. 393: The Standard Model – Leptons & Quarks
Physicists are getting a handle on the structure of the Universe, how everything is made of something else. Molecules are made of atoms, atoms are made of protons, neutrons and electrons, etc. Even...
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Who Was Democritus?
As the philosopher Nietzsche famously said "He who would learn to fly one day must first learn to stand and walk and run and climb and dance; one cannot fly into flying." This is certainly true when...
View ArticleAstronomy Cast Ep. 374: Stern-Gerlach Experiment
In the world of quantum mechanics, particles behave in discreet ways. One breakthrough experiment was the Stern-Gerlach Experiment, performed in 1922. They passed silver atoms through a magnetic field...
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