What is Matter???
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Matter is anything that has mass, and takes up
space
examples:
bowling balls have lots of mass - they are heavy - so they
are made of matter
 you have mass, and you take up space, so you are made
of matter
 air has only a little mass, but it has some, and takes up
lots of space, so air is matter.
 any kind of material, solid, liquid, or gas is made of
matter
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Matter (of any kind) is made up of extremely
tiny particles.
These particles are constantly in motion.
At higher temperatures, these particles move
faster. They would only stop moving at -273
degrees C.
These particles are held together by forces of
attraction, but never actually touch each other.
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Solids
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Liquids
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solids have definite shape and definite volume
the particles in solids are held strongly in position, usually in some
geometrical pattern
the particles in a solid only move by vibrating - they can't leave their
positions
liquids have definite volume, but take the shape of their container
the particles in a liquid are held closely together, but are free to move
around
the particles have enough energy so that they are not locked in position
Gases
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gases have no definite shape or volume. They will spread out to fill any
container that they are in.
the particles of a gas are widely spaced, and are not held together at all
the particles of a gas are flying around very rapidly, at about 1000 km/h
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Atoms and Molecules are the Particles described in
the Particle Theory of Matter
An atom is the smallest particle of matter
Atoms cannot be divided into simpler parts by any
physical or chemical method
This is what John Dalton thought that an atom looked
like:
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This is what we now think an atom looks like:
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A Molecule is made up of two or more atoms,
combined chemically.
By combining together different arrangements
of the slightly more than 100 different kinds of
atoms which are known to exist, every kind of
substance in the entire universe can be made.
(Certain special rules determine which atoms
can or cannot be combined together)
This is what a model of a water molecule looks
like, with one oxygen atom, and two hydrogen
atoms:
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Democritus, a philosopher in ancient Greece, over 2000 years ago, figured out that
matter must be made of particles, and he called the smallest of these particles, the atom
About 1800 year later, an Englishman, John Dalton, came up with more or less the same
idea. He said that atoms were extremely tiny, indivisible, and indestructible, but he also
said that all the atoms of a certain element had the same mass. He also said that different
kinds of elements were made up of atoms of different masses.
Since Dalton lived about 200 years ago, today's scientists know a lot more about atoms,
and how they are made up, than he did. However, his idea of what atoms are like,
makes it easy for us to see how molecules are made up.
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Elements
Elements are substances made up of only one kind of atom.
Elements, therefore, cannot be broken down into any simpler
substances by physical or chemical methods.
Examples of commonly-known elements are oxygen, carbon,
hydrogen, iron, copper, silver, and gold.
The four most important elements in the human body are carbon
(C), oxygen (O), hydrogen (H), and nitrogen (N)
The letters in the brackets in the line above are called symbols.
These are the correct, official, abbreviations for the names of these
elements.
Here are some more symbols: iron is Fe, copper is Cu, silver is Ag,
gold is Au, sodium is Na, and chlorine is Cl .
The first letter in any element's symbol is always capitalized. The
second letter (if there is one) is never capitalized.
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Compounds are substances made up of at least two different kinds of
elements, combined chemically.
Compounds cannot be broken down by physical methods, but they can
be broken down by chemical methods.
Commonly-known compounds are water (H20), cane sugar (C12H22O11),
and table salt (NaCl)
In brackets in the line above, are shown the formulas of each of those
compounds. A formula is the correct, official abbreviation for the name of
a compound, which also shows how the molecules of that compound are
put together.
You can recognize the symbols of the elements that make up those
compounds.
The small, subscripted number after an element's symbol in the formula
tells how many atoms of that element there are, in one molecule of that
compound.