Ancient Atomic Theory

One of the first atomic theorists was Democritus, a Greek

philosopher who lived in the fifth century BC. Democritus knew that if
a stone was divided in half, the two halves would have essentially the
same properties as the whole.Therefore, he reasoned that if the
stone were to be continually cut into smaller and smaller pieces then;
at some point, there would be a piece which would be so small as to
be indivisible. He called these small pieces of matter "atomos," the
Greek word for indivisible. Democritus, theorized that atoms were
specific to the material which they composed. In addition, Democritus
believed that the atoms differed in size and shape, were in constant motion in a void, collided
with each other; and during these collisions, could rebound or stick together. Therefore,
changes in matter were a result of dissociations or combinations of the atoms as they moved
throughout the void. Although Democritus' theory was remarkable, it was rejected by Aristotle,
one of the most influential philosophers of Ancient Greece; and the atomic theory was ignored
for nearly 2,000 years.

Early Atomic Theory

Although the idea of the atom was first suggested by Democritus in the
fourth century BC, his suppositions were not useful in explaining chemical
phenomena, because there was no experimental evidence to support them.
It was not until the late 1700's that early chemists began to explain
chemical behavior in terms of the atom. Joseph Priestly, Antoine Lavoisier,
and others set the stage for the foundation of chemistry. They
demonstrated that substances could combine to form new materials. It was
the English chemist, John Dalton, who put the pieces of the puzzle together
and developed an atomic theory in 1803.

Dalton's atomic theory contains five basic assumptions:

 All matter consists of tiny particles called atoms. Dalton and others imagined the atoms
that composed all matter as tiny, solid spheres in various stages of motion.
 Atoms are indestructible and unchangeable. Atoms of an element cannot be created,
destroyed, divided into smaller pieces, or transformed into atoms of another
element. Dalton based this hypothesis on the law of conservation of mass as stated by
Antoine Lavoisier and others around 1785.
 Elements are characterized by the weight of their atoms. Dalton suggested that all atoms
of the same element have identical weights. Therefore, every single atom of an element
 such as oxygen is identical to every other oxygen atom. However, atoms of different
elements, such as oxygen and mercury, are different from each other.
 In chemical reactions, atoms combine in small, whole-number ratios. Experiments
that Dalton and others performed indicated that chemical reactions proceed according
to atom to atom ratios which were precise and well-defined.
 When elements react, their atoms may combine in more than one whole-number
ratio. Dalton used this assumption to explain why the ratios of two elements in various
compounds, such as oxygen and nitrogen in nitrogen oxides, differed by multiples of
each other.

John Dalton's atomic theory was generally accepted because it explained the laws of
conservation of mass, definite proportions, multiple proportions, and other observations.
Although exceptions to Dalton's theory are now known, his theory has endured reasonably well,
with modifications, throughout the years.

Modern Atomic Theory: Electrically Charged Particles

Approximately fifty years after John Dalton's proposal of the atom, evidence began to
accumulate which suggested that the atom might not be the solid sphere that Dalton had
envisioned. This evidence came in the form of the discovery of electrically charged particles and
radioactive materials. Based on these new discoveries, Dalton's proposal of a solid,
indestructible atom became unacceptable. Listed below, are a few of the significant discoveries
that were clues that led to the development of the modern theory of the atom.

In the 1830's, Michael Faraday, a British physicist, made one of the most significant discoveries
that led to the idea that atoms had an electrical component. Faraday placed two
opposite electrodes in a solution of water containing a dissolved compound. He observed that
one of the elements of the dissolved compound accumulated on one electrode, and the other
element was deposited on the opposite electrode. It was clear to Faraday that electrical forces
were responsible for the joining of atoms in compounds.

In 1879, Sir William Crookes studied the effects of sending an electric current through a gas in a
sealed tube. The tube had electrodes at either end and a flow of electrically charged particles
moved from one of electrodes. This electrode was called the cathode, and the particles were
known as cathode rays. The particles were first believed to be negatively charged atoms or
molecules. However, subsequent experiments showed that these particles could penetrate thin
sheets of material which would not be possible if the particles were as large as atoms or
molecules.

In 1895, Wilhelm Roentgen, experimenting with cathode rays, discovered new and different
kinds of rays. Roentgen discovered that if he directed these rays toward a paper plate coated
with barium platinocyanide, the plate became fluorescent. During subsequent experiments, he
 found the rays created an image on a photographic plate. These "new" rays were originally
known as Roentgen rays. We know them today as x-rays which are part of
the electromagnetic spectrum.

Modern Atomic Theory: Radioactive Materials

In 1896, Henri Bequerel was studying the fluorescent properties of uranium salts and placed a
piece of the uranium salt on top of a photographic plate wrapped in black paper. He
discovered, upon development, that the plate was exposed in the shape of the uranium
sample. Bequerel had discovered radioactivity. The radiation emitted by the uranium shared
certain properties with x-rays and light. Becquerel and two of his students, Marie and Pierre
Curie, shared the 1903 Nobel Prize in Physics for their studies in spontaneous radiation.
Further experiments by other scientists showed that when the beam from a radioactive ore
was passed through a strong magnetic field, there were three kinds of radiation emitted.
These rays were named alpha, beta, and gamma by Ernest Rutherford. Alpha radiation is a
stream of positive particles composed of two protons and two neutrons (helium nuclei), beta
radiation is a stream of particles with negative charges now known as electrons, and gamma
radiation is part of the electromagnetic spectrum.
Based on the evidence of experiments in the latter part of the 19th century, it became
apparent that the atom was not a solid sphere, and was far more complex than originally
thought by the early Greek philosophers and John Dalton. A new model of the atom would
have to be developed to incorporate these new findings.

Modern Atomic Theory: Models

In 1897, J.J. Thomson discovered the electron by experimenting with a Crookes, or cathode
ray, tube. He demonstrated that cathode rays were negatively charged. In addition, he also
studied positively charged particles in neon gas. Thomson realized that the accepted model of
an atom did not account for negatively or positively charged particles. Therefore, he proposed a
model of the atom which he likened to plum pudding. The negative electrons represented the
raisins in the pudding and the dough contained the positive charge. Thomson's model of the
atom did explain some of the electrical properties of the atom due to the electrons, but failed to
recognize the positive charges in the atom as particles.

In 1911, Ernest Rutherford, a former student of J.J. Thomson, proved Thomson's plum pudding
structure incorrect. Rutherford with the assistance of Ernest Marsden and Hans Geiger
performed a series of experiments using alpha particles. Rutherford aimed alpha particles at
solid substances such as gold foil and recorded the location of the alpha particle "strikes" on a
fluorescent screen as they passed through the foil. To the experimenters’ amazement, although
most of the alpha particles passed unaffected through the gold foil as expected, a small number
of particles were deflected at an angle, and a few ricocheted straight
back. Rutherford concluded that the atom consisted of a small, dense, positively charged
nucleus in the center of the atom with negatively charged electrons surrounding it. The
discovery of the nucleus is considered to be Rutherford's greatest scientific work.

Modern Atomic Theory: Models

In 1913, Neils Bohr, a student of Rutherford's, developed

a new model of the atom. He proposed that electrons
are arranged in concentric circular orbits around the
nucleus. This model is patterned on the solar system
and is known as the planetary model. The Bohr model
can be summarized by the following four principles:

1. Electrons occupy only certain orbits around the

nucleus. Those orbits are stable and are called
"stationary" orbits.
2. Each orbit has an energy associated with it. The
orbit nearest the nucleus has an energy of E1, the
next orbit E2, etc.
3. Energy is absorbed when an electron jumps from
Bohr model
a lower orbit to a higher one and energy is
emitted when an electron falls from a higher orbit to a lower orbit.
4. The energy and frequency of light emitted or absorbed can be calculated by using the
difference between the two orbital energies.

In 1926 Erwin Schrödinger, an Austrian physicist, took the Bohr

atom model one step further. Schrödinger used mathematical
equations to describe the likelihood of finding an electron in a
certain position. This atomic model is known as the quantum
mechanical model of the atom. Unlike the Bohr model, the
quantum mechanical model does not define the exact path of
an electron, but rather, predicts the odds of the location of the
electron. This model can be portrayed as a nucleus surrounded
by an electron cloud. Where the cloud is most dense, the
probability of finding the electron is greatest, and conversely,

Quantum mechanical model

 the electron is less likely to be in a less dense area of the cloud. Thus, this model introduced the
concept of sub-energy levels.

Until 1932, the atom was believed to be composed of a positively charged nucleus surrounded
by negatively charged electrons. In 1932, James Chadwick bombarded beryllium atoms with
alpha particles. An unknown radiation was produced. Chadwick interpreted this radiation as
being composed of particles with a neutral electrical charge and the approximate mass of a
proton. This particle became known as the neutron. With the discovery of the neutron, an
adequate model of the atom became available to chemists.

Since 1932, through continued experimentation, many additional particles have been
discovered in the atom. Also, new elements have been created by bombarding existing nuclei
with various subatomic particles. The atomic theory has been further enhanced by the concept
that protons and neutrons are made of even smaller units called quarks. The quarks
themselves are in turn made of vibrating strings of energy. The theory of the composition of the
atom continues to be an ongoing and exciting adventure.

Development of atomic theory

Table of Contents
The concept of the atom that Western scientists accepted in broad outline from the 1600s until about
1900 originated with Greek philosophers in the 5th century BCE. Their speculation about a hard,
indivisible fundamental particle of nature was replaced slowly by a scientific theory supported by
experiment and mathematical deduction. It was more than 2,000 years before modern physicists
realized that the atom is indeed divisible and that it is not hard, solid, or immutable.

The atomic philosophy of the early Greeks

Leucippus of Miletus (5th century BCE) is thought to have originated the atomic philosophy. His
famous disciple, Democritus of Abdera, named the building blocks of matter atomos, meaning literally

“indivisible,” about 430 BCE. Democritus believed that atoms were uniform, solid, hard,
incompressible, and indestructible and that they moved in infinite numbers through empty space until

stopped. Differences in atomic shape and size determined the various properties of matter. In
Democritus’s philosophy, atoms existed not only for matter but also for such qualities as perception and
the human soul. For example, sourness was caused by needle-shaped atoms, while the colour white was
composed of smooth-surfaced atoms. The atoms of the soul were considered to be particularly fine.
Democritus developed his atomic philosophy as a middle ground between two opposing Greek theories
about reality and the illusion of change. He argued that matter was subdivided into indivisible and

immutable particles that created the appearance of change when they joined and separated from others.

The philosopher Epicurus of Samos (341–270 BCE) used Democritus’s ideas to try to quiet the fears of
superstitious Greeks. According to Epicurus’s materialistic philosophy, the entire universe was
composed exclusively of atoms and void, and so even the gods were subject to natural laws.

Most of what is known about the atomic philosophy of the early Greeks comes from Aristotle’s attacks
on it and from a long poem, De rerum natura (“On the Nature of Things”), which Latin poet and
philosopher Titus Lucretius Carus (c. 95–55 BCE) wrote to popularize its ideas. The Greek atomic
theory is significant historically and philosophically, but it has no scientific value. It was not based on
observations of nature, measurements, tests, or experiments. Instead, the Greeks used mathematics and
reason almost exclusively when they wrote about physics. Like the later theologians of the Middle
Ages, they wanted an all-encompassing theory to explain the universe, not merely a detailed
experimental view of a tiny portion of it. Science constituted only one aspect of their broad

philosophical system. Thus, Plato and Aristotle attacked Democritus’s atomic theory on philosophical
grounds rather than on scientific ones. Plato valued abstract ideas more than the physical world and
rejected the notion that attributes such as goodness and beauty were “mechanical manifestations of

material atoms.” Where Democritus believed that matter could not move through space without
a vacuum and that light was the rapid movement of particles through a void, Aristotle rejected the
existence of vacuums because he could not conceive of bodies falling equally fast through a void.
Aristotle’s conception prevailed in medieval Christian Europe; its science was based on revelation and

reason, and the Roman Catholic theologians rejected Democritus as materialistic and atheistic.

The emergence of experimental science

De rerum natura, which was rediscovered in the 15th century, helped fuel a 17th-century debate
between orthodox Aristotelian views and the new experimental science. The poem was printed in 1649
and popularized by Pierre Gassendi, a French priest who tried to separate Epicurus’s atomism from its
materialistic background by arguing that God created atoms.

Soon after Italian scientist Galileo Galilei expressed his belief that vacuums can exist (1638), scientists
began studying the properties of air and partial vacuums to test the relative merits of Aristotelian
orthodoxy and the atomic theory. The experimental evidence about air was only gradually separated
from this philosophical controversy.

Boyle's law
Anglo-Irish chemist Robert Boyle began his systematic study of air in 1658 after he learned that Otto

von Guericke, a German physicist and engineer, had invented an improved air pump four years earlier.
In 1662 Boyle published the first physical law expressed in the form of an equation that describes the
functional dependence of two variable quantities. This formulation became known as Boyle’s law.
From the beginning, Boyle wanted to analyze the elasticity of air quantitatively, not just qualitatively,
and to separate the particular experimental problem about air’s “spring” from the surrounding
philosophical issues. Pouring mercury into the open end of a closed J-shaped tube, Boyle forced the air
in the short side of the tube to contract under the pressure of the mercury on top. By doubling the
height of the mercury column, he roughly doubled the pressure and halved the volume of air. By
tripling the pressure, he cut the volume of air to a third, and so on.

This behaviour can be formulated mathematically in the relation PV = P′V′, where P and V are the
pressure and volume under one set of conditions and P′ and V′ represent them under different
conditions. Boyle’s law says that pressure and volume are inversely related for a given quantity of gas.
Although it is only approximately true for real gases, Boyle’s law is an extremely useful idealization
that played an important role in the development of atomic theory.

Soon after his air-pressure experiments, Boyle wrote that all matter is composed of solid particles
arranged into molecules to give material its different properties. He explained that all things are

In France Boyle’s law is called Mariotte’s law after physicist Edme Mariotte, who discovered
the empirical relationship independently in 1676. Mariotte realized that the law holds true only under

constant temperatures; otherwise, the volume of gas expands when heated or contracts when cooled.

Forty years later Isaac Newton expressed a typical 18th-century view of the atom that was similar to
that of Democritus, Gassendi, and Boyle. In the last query in his book Opticks (1704), Newton stated:

All these things being considered, it seems probable to me that God in the Beginning
form’d Matter in solid, massy, hard, impenetrable, moveable Particles, of such Sizes
and Figures, and with such other Properties, and in such Proportion to Space, as most
 conduced to the End for which he form’d them; and that these primitive Particles being
Solids, are incomparably harder than any porous Bodies compounded of them; even so

very hard, as never to wear or break in pieces; no ordinary Power being able to divide
what God himself made one in the first Creation.
By the end of the 18th century, chemists were just beginning to learn how chemicals combine. In
1794 Joseph-Louis Proust of France published his law of definite proportions (also known as Proust’s
law). He stated that the components of chemical compounds always combine in the same proportions

by weight. For example, Proust found that no matter where he obtained his samples of
the compound copper carbonate, they were composed by weight of five parts copper, four

parts oxygen, and one part carbon.

The beginnings of modern atomic theory

Experimental foundation of atomic chemistry
Know how scientists discovered atoms and the instruments that help them view these small particles

See all videos for this article

English chemist and physicist John Dalton extended Proust’s work and converted the atomic
philosophy of the Greeks into a scientific theory between 1803 and 1808. His book A New System of
Chemical Philosophy (Part I, 1808; Part II, 1810) was the first application of atomic theory
to chemistry. It provided a physical picture of how elements combine to form compounds and a

phenomenological reason for believing that atoms exist. His work, together with that of Joseph-Louis
Gay-Lussac of France and Amedeo Avogadro of Italy, provided the experimental foundation of atomic
chemistry.

On the basis of the law of definite proportions, Dalton deduced the law of multiple proportions, which
stated that when two elements form more than one compound by combining in more than one

proportion by weight, the weight of one element in one of the compounds is in simple, integer ratios to
its weights in the other compounds. For example, Dalton knew that oxygen and carbon can combine to
form two different compounds and that carbon dioxide (CO2) contains twice as much oxygen by
weight as carbon monoxide (CO). In this case the ratio of oxygen in one compound to the amount of
oxygen in the other is the simple integer ratio 2:1. Although Dalton called his theory “modern”
to differentiate it from Democritus’s philosophy, he retained the Greek term atom to honour the

ancients.

Dalton had begun his atomic studies by wondering why the different gases in the atmosphere do not
separate, with the heaviest on the bottom and the lightest on the top. He decided that atoms are
not infinite in variety as had been supposed and that they are limited to one of a kind for each element.

Proposing that all the atoms of a given element have the same fixed mass, he concluded that elements
react in definite proportions to form compounds because their constituent atoms react in definite

proportion to produce compounds. He then tried to figure out the masses for well-known compounds.
To do so, Dalton made a faulty but understandable assumption that the simplest hypothesis about

atomic combinations was true. He maintained that the molecules of an element would always be single
atoms. Thus, if two elements form only one compound, he believed that one atom of one element
combined with one atom of another element. For example, describing the formation of water, he said
that one atom of hydrogen and one of oxygen would combine to form HO instead of
H2O. Dalton’s mistaken belief that atoms join together by attractive forces was accepted and formed
the basis of most of 19th-century chemistry. As long as scientists worked with masses as ratios, a
consistent chemistry could be developed because they did not need to know whether the atoms were
separate or joined together as molecules.

Gay-Lussac soon took the relationship between chemical masses implied by Dalton’s atomic theory
and expanded it to volumetric relationships of gases. In 1809 he published two observations about
gases that have come to be known as Gay-Lussac’s law of combining gases. The first part of the law
says that when gases combine chemically, they do so in numerically simple volume ratios. Gay-Lussac

illustrated this part of his law with three oxides of nitrogen. The compound NO has equal parts of
nitrogen and oxygen by volume. Similarly, in the compound N2O the two parts by volume of nitrogen
combine with one part of oxygen. He found corresponding volumes of nitrogen and oxygen in NO2.
Thus, Gay-Lussac’s law relates volumes of the chemical constituents within a compound, unlike

Dalton’s law of multiple proportions, which relates only one constituent of a compound with the same
constituent in other compounds.
The second part of Gay-Lussac’s law states that if gases combine to form gases, the volumes of the
products are also in simple numerical ratios to the volume of the original gases. This part of the law
was illustrated by the combination of carbon monoxide and oxygen to form carbon dioxide. Gay-
Lussac noted that the volume of the carbon dioxide is equal to the volume of carbon monoxide and is
twice the volume of oxygen. He did not realize, however, that the reason that only half as much oxygen
is needed is because the oxygen molecule splits in two to give a single atom to each molecule of carbon
monoxide. In his “Mémoire sur la combinaison des substances gazeuses, les unes avec les autres”
(1809; “Memoir on the Combination of Gaseous Substances with Each Other”), Gay-Lussac wrote:

Thus it appears evident to me that gases always combine in the simplest proportions
when they act on one another; and we have seen in reality in all the preceding examples
that the ratio of combination is 1 to 1, 1 to 2 or 1 to 3.…Gases…in whatever
proportions they may combine, always give rise to compounds whose elements by
volume are multiples of each other.…Not only, however, do gases combine in very
simple proportions, as we have just seen, but the apparent contraction of volume which
they experience on combination has also a simple relation to the volume of the gases, or
at least to one of them.
Gay-Lussac’s work raised the question of whether atoms differ from molecules and, if so, how many
atoms and molecules are in a volume of gas. Amedeo Avogadro, building on Dalton’s efforts, solved
the puzzle, but his work was ignored for 50 years. In 1811 Avogadro proposed two hypotheses: (1) The

atoms of elemental gases may be joined together in molecules rather than existing as separate atoms, as
Dalton believed. (2) Equal volumes of gases contain equal numbers of molecules. These hypotheses
explained why only half a volume of oxygen is necessary to combine with a volume of carbon
monoxide to form carbon dioxide. Each oxygen molecule has two atoms, and each atom of oxygen
joins one molecule of carbon monoxide.

Until the early 1860s, however, the allegiance of chemists to another concept espoused by eminent

Swedish chemist Jöns Jacob Berzelius blocked acceptance of Avogadro’s ideas. (Berzelius was
influential among chemists because he had determined the atomic weights of many elements extremely
accurately.) Berzelius contended incorrectly that all atoms of a similar element repel each other because
they have the same electric charge. He thought that only atoms with opposite charges could combine to
form molecules.
Because early chemists did not know how many atoms were in a molecule, their chemical notation
systems were in a state of chaos by the mid-19th century. Berzelius and his followers, for example,

used the general formula MO for the chief metallic oxides, while others assigned the formula used
today, M2O. A single formula stood for different substances, depending on the chemist:
H2O2 was water or hydrogen peroxide; C2H4 was methane or ethylene. Proponents of the system used
today based their chemical notation on an empirical law formulated in 1819 by the French

scientists Pierre-Louis Dulong and Alexis-Thérèse Petit concerning the specific heat of elements.
According to the Dulong-Petit law, the specific heat of all elements is the same on a per atom basis.
This law, however, was found to have many exceptions and was not fully understood until the
development of quantum theory in the 20th century.

To resolve such problems of chemical notation, Sicilian chemist Stanislao

Cannizzaro revived Avogadro’s ideas in 1858 and expounded them at the First International Chemical

Congress, which met in Karlsruhe, Germany, in 1860. Lothar Meyer, a noted German chemistry
professor, wrote later that when he heard Avogadro’s theory at the congress, “It was as though scales
fell from my eyes, doubt vanished, and was replaced by a feeling of peaceful certainty.” Within a few
years, Avogadro’s hypotheses were widely accepted in the world of chemistry.

THE ATOMIC THEORY OF MATTER

The atomic theory of matter seeks to explain the nature of matter-the materials of which the Universe, all galaxies, solar
systems and Earth are formed.

First postulated by JOHN DALTON, the atomic theory of matter contends:

Each chemical element is made of fundamental units called ATOMS.

All of the atoms of a given element are identical. Gold, copper, iron, zinc-these are all individual elements made up of the
same atoms. All gold atoms are exactly like all other gold atoms and unlike any other kind of atom. All copper atoms are
exactly like all other copper atoms and unlike any other kind of atom.

Atoms combine with one another to form more complex units called molecules. All molecules are made of constituent
atoms. All molecules of water are made of two atoms of hydrogen and one atom of oxygen-no other element ever makes
water. All water molecules are exactly like all other water molecules-they are all made of only hydrogen and oxygen in the
atomic ratio of two to one.

ATOMS ARE FUNDAMENTAL UNITS OF MATTER AND ALL ATOMS ARE CONSERVED IN CHEMICAL
REACTIONS.
IN CHEMICAL REACTIONS, ATOMS ARE REARRANGED AND REGROUPED TO FORM COMPOUNDS (NAME
WE GIVE TO MOLECULES FORMED FROM ATOMS). FOR EXAMPLE, TWO ATOMS OF HYDROGEN AND AN
ATOM OF OXYGEN REACT TO FORM THE COMPOUND-WATER. THIS COMPOUND IS MADE OF MOLECULES
OF WATER.

LAW OF CONSERVATION OF MATTER

THIS SCIENTIFIC LAW TELLS US THAT ALL ATOMS ARE CONSERVED IN A CHEMICAL REACTION. YOU
END UP WITH THE SAME MASS AS YOU BEGAN.
FOR EXAMPLE, WHEN TWO ATOMS OF HYDROGEN REACT WITH ONE ATOM OF OXYGEN, EXACTLY ONE
MOLECULE (MADE UP OF THREE ATOMS) OF WATER IS PRODUCED. THERE IS ABSOLUTELY NO LOSS OF
MASS AS A RESULT OF THIS CHEMICAL OR ANY CHEMICAL REACTION.

LAW OF CONSTANT COMPOSITION

THIS SCIENTIFIC LAW TELLS US THAT ATOMS REACT IN PREDICTABLE WAYS THAT RESULT IN
COMPOUNDS OF CONSTANT (ALWAYS THE SAME) COMPOSITION.
THE MOLECULE AMMONIA HAS THE FORMULA: NH3. THIS MEANS THAT ONE ATOM OF NITROGEN
ALWAYS COMBINES WITH THREE ATOMS OF HYDROGEN TO GIVE ONE MOLECULE OF AMMONIA. THE
COMPOSITION OF AMMONIA NEVER VARIES, IT IS CONSTANT-NO MATTER WHETHER IT OCCURS ON
ANOTHER PLANET, ANOTHER GALAXY, NO MATTER WHERE.

THE ELECTRONIC STRUCTURE OF THE

AT O M
Before the beginning of the 20th century, it was believed that the atom was the smallest
particle that could exist. After 1897, smaller particles were identified (Barrio
Gómez de Agüero, 2012). As you saw in the previous section, the atom is composed of
particles that can have an electronic charge (positive or negative), or be electrically
neutral. These particles may also have mass, or be so light, for our purposes, we can
say they have no mass. A neutral atom has equal numbers of positive and negative
particles, so overall there is no charge..