-
Asked by 552rdme39 to Adrian, Gaia, Jim, Scott, Vicky on 5 Mar 2016.
-
Adrian Buzatu answered on 5 Mar 2016:
It’s the electric force. The electron is negatively charged. The nucleus is positively charged. As a result, a force of attraction between them appears.
-
-
Scott Lawrie answered on 7 Mar 2016:
The electric force attracts the negative electrons to the positive nucleus. You would think that the electrons would all spiral down and be sucked into the middle. However quantum mechanics keeps the electrons on nice circular orbits as they can only be in certain places in the atom.
-
Jim Barrett answered on 8 Mar 2016:
This is one of those questions which gets harder the more physics you learn, and I’m actually not confident I completely understand it!
A very simplified answer is that since the electron is negatively charged, and the has positively charged Protons in it, they tend to attract one another.
Comments
552rdme39 commented on :
so how is that force ‘split’ to allow the electron beams like the ones that you find in electron microscopes
Scott commented on :
It’s very easy to get a free electron and make an electron beam. For example, a hydrogen atom is a proton orbited by one electron. The force holding them together has a value of 13.6volts. If you put a couple of ordinary batteries across a hydrogen atom it would split it apart by having a higher voltage than is holding the electron in place. Once the electron is free, you can move it about however you like!
Adrian commented on :
In electron microscopes there are beams of electrons. These electrons are free from atoms. Using an electric field these electrons can be guided as if through a lens, allowing us to see very small things.
552rdme39 commented on :
oh okay thanks