Electron

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

For other uses, see Electron (disambiguation).

Electron

Hydrogen atom orbitals at different energy levels. The brighter areas are where you are most likely to find
an electron at any given time.

Composition

Elementary particle[1]

Statistics

Fermionic

Generation

First

Interactions

Gravity, electromagnetic, weak

Symbol

e,

Antiparticle

Positron (also called antielectron)

Theorized

Richard Laming (18381851),[2]

G. Johnstone Stoney (1874) and others.[3][4]

Discovered

J. J. Thomson (1897)[5]

Mass

9.10938356(11)1031 kg[6]
5.48579909070(16)104 u[6]
[1822.8884845(14)]1 u[note 1]
0.5109989461(31) MeV/c2[6]

Mean lifetime

stable ( > 6.61028 yr[7])

Electric charge

1 e[note 2]
1.602176565(35)1019 C[6]
4.80320451(10)1010 esu

Magnetic moment

Spin

1.00115965218076(27) B[6]

1/2

The electron is a subatomic particle, symbol e or , with a negative elementary electric charge.
Electrons belong to the firstgeneration of the lepton particle family, and are generally thought to
be elementary particles because they have no known components or substructure. The electron
has a mass that is approximately 1/1836 that of the proton. Quantum mechanical properties of the
electron include an intrinsic angular momentum (spin) of a half-integer value in units of , which
means that it is a fermion. Being fermions, no two electrons can occupy the same quantum state, in
accordance with the Pauli exclusion principle. Like all matter, electrons have properties of both
particles and waves, and so can collide with other particles and can be diffracted like light. The wave
properties of electrons are easier to observe with experiments than those of other particles like
neutrons and protons because electrons have a lower mass and hence a higher De Broglie
wavelength for typical energies.
[8]

[9]

[1]

[10]

[9]

Many physical phenomena involve electrons in an essential role, such as electricity, magnetism,
and thermal conductivity, and they also participate
in gravitational, electromagnetic and weak interactions. An electron generates an electric
fieldsurrounding it. An electron moving relative to an observer generates a magnetic field. External
magnetic fields deflect an electron. Electrons radiate or absorb energy in the form of photons when
accelerated. Laboratory instruments are capable of containing and observing individual electrons as
well as electron plasma using electromagnetic fields, whereas dedicatedtelescopes can detect
electron plasma in outer space. Electrons are involved in many applications such
as electronics, welding,cathode ray tubes, electron microscopes, radiation therapy, lasers, gaseous
ionization detectors and particle accelerators.
[11]

Interactions involving electrons and other subatomic particles are of interest in fields such
as chemistry and nuclear physics. The Coulomb force interaction between
positive protons inside atomic nuclei and negative electrons composes atoms. Ionization or changes
in the proportions of particles changes the binding energy of the system. The exchange or sharing of
the electrons between two or more atoms is the main cause of chemical bonding. British natural
philosopher Richard Laming first hypothesized the concept of an indivisible quantity of electric
charge to explain the chemical properties of atoms in 1838; Irish physicist George Johnstone
Stoney named this charge 'electron' in 1891, and J. J. Thomson and his team of British physicists
identified it as a particle in 1897.
Electrons can also participate in nuclear reactions, such
as nucleosynthesis in stars, where they are known as beta particles. Electrons may be created
through beta decay of radioactive isotopes and in high-energy collisions, for instance when cosmic
[12]

[3]

[5][13][14]

rays enter the atmosphere. The antiparticle of the electron is called the positron; it is identical to the
electron except that it carries electrical and other charges of the opposite sign. When an electron
collides with a positron, both particles may be totally annihilated, producing gamma ray photons.

Proton
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article is about the proton as a subatomic particle. For other uses, see Proton (disambiguation).

Proton

The quark structure of the proton. The color assignment of individual

quarks is arbitrary, but all three colors must be present. Forces between
quarks are mediated by gluons.

Classification

Baryon

Composition

2 up quarks, 1 down quark

Statistics

Fermionic

Interactions

Gravity, electromagnetic, weak,strong

Symbol

p, p+, N+

Antiparticle

Antiproton

Theorized

William Prout (1815)

Discovered

Ernest Rutherford (19171919, named by

him, 1920)

Mass

1.672621777(74)1027 kg[1]
938.272046(21) MeV/c2[1]
1.007276466812(90) u[1]

Mean lifetime

>2.11029 years (stable)

Electric charge

+1 e
1.602176565(35)1019 C[1]

Charge radius

0.8775(51) fm[1]

Electric dipole moment

<5.41024 ecm

Electric polarizability

1.20(6)103 fm3

Magnetic moment

1.410606743(33)1026 JT1[1]
1.521032210(12)103 B[1]
2.792847356(23) N[1]

Magnetic polarizability

1.9(5)104 fm3

Spin

Isospin

Parity

+1

Condensed

I(JP) = 12(12+)

2
2

The proton is a subatomic particle, symbol p or p+, with a positive electric charge of +1e elementary
charge and mass slightly less than that of a neutron. Protons and neutrons, each with mass
approximately one atomic mass unit, are collectively referred to as "nucleons". One or more protons
are present in the nucleus of every atom. The number of protons in the nucleus is the defining
property of an element, and is referred to as the atomic number. Since each elementhas a unique
number of protons, each element has its own unique atomic number. The word proton is Greek for
"first", and this name was given to the hydrogen nucleus by Ernest Rutherford in 1920. In previous
years Rutherford had discovered that the hydrogen nucleus (known to be the lightest nucleus) could
be extracted from the nuclei of nitrogen by collision. The proton was therefore a candidate to be
a fundamental particle and a building block of nitrogen and all other heavier atomic nuclei.
In the modern Standard Model of particle physics, the proton is a hadron, and like the neutron, the
other nucleon (particle present in atomic nuclei), is composed of three quarks. Although the proton
was originally considered a fundamental orelementary particle, it is now known to be composed of
three valence quarks: two up quarks and one down quark. Therest masses of the quarks contribute
only about 1% of the proton's mass, however.[2] The remainder of the proton mass is due to
the kinetic energy of the quarks and to the energy of the gluon fields that bind the quarks together.

Because the proton is not a fundamental particle, it possesses a physical size; the radius of the
proton is about 0.840.87 fm.[3]
At sufficiently low temperatures, free protons will bind to electrons. However, the character of such
bound protons does not change, and they remain protons. A fast proton moving through matter will
slow by interactions with electrons and nuclei, until it is captured by the electron cloud of an atom.
The result is a protonated atom, which is a chemical compoundof hydrogen. In vacuum, when free
electrons are present, a sufficiently slow proton may pick up a single free electron, becoming a
neutral hydrogen atom, which is chemically a free radical. Such "free hydrogen atoms" tend to react
chemically with many other types of atoms at sufficiently low energies. When free hydrogen atoms
react with each other, they form neutral hydrogen molecules (H2), which are the most common
molecular component of molecular clouds ininterstellar space. Such molecules of hydrogen on Earth
may then serve (among many other uses) as a convenient source of protons for accelerators (as
used in proton therapy) and other hadron particle physics experiments that require protons to
accelerate, with the most powerful and noted example being the Large Hadron Collider.

Discovery of the neutron

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

James Chadwick discovered the neutron in 1932 while working atCavendish Laboratory.

The story of the discovery of the neutron and its properties is central to the extraordinary
developments in atomic physics that occurred in the first half of the 20th century. The century began
with Ernest Rutherford and Thomas Royds proving that alpha radiation is helium ions in 1908
and Rutherford's model for the atom in 1911, in which atoms have their mass and positive charge
concentrated in a very smallnucleus. The essential nature of the atomic nucleus was established
with the discovery of the neutron by James Chadwick in 1932.
[1]

[2]

[3]

[4]

Cathode ray
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced
material may be challenged and removed. (February 2011)

A beam of cathode rays bent into a circle by a magnetic field generated by a Helmholtz coil. Cathode rays are normally invisible; in this tube enough residual gas has been left
that the gas atoms glow from fluorescence when struck by the fast moving electrons.

Cathode rays (also called an electron beam or e-beam) are streams of electrons observed
in vacuum tubes. If an evacuated glass tube is equipped with two electrodes and a voltage is
applied, the glass opposite of the negative electrode is observed to glow, due to electrons emitted
from and travelling perpendicular to the cathode (the electrode connected to the negative terminal of
the voltage supply). They were first observed in 1869 by German physicist Johann Hittorf, and were
named in 1876 by Eugen Goldstein Kathodenstrahlen, or cathode rays.
[1][2]

Electrons were first discovered as the constituents of cathode rays. In 1897 British physicist J. J.
Thomson showed the rays were composed of a previously unknown negatively charged particle,
which was later named the electron. Cathode ray tubes (CRTs) use a focused beam of electrons
deflected by electric or magnetic fields to create the image in a classic television set.