Why are there different chemical elements?

Answer 1

Perhaps you should be asking this question on the Religion board.

Lets see what the intelligent design crew have to say.

Answer 2

Phew - tall order question! Firstly, the elements are substances found on the Earth (and in the solar system and universe) that are composed of only ONE type of atom. So, gold, silver, hydrogen, aluminium, phosphorous etc are all "pure", with nothing added in to the mix. Gold is composed completely of gold atoms, and hydrogen is composed completely of hydrogen atoms. On the other hand, compounds such as salt are made by combining sodium atoms together with chlorine atoms - forming a compound whose physical and chemical properties are completely different to the parent compounds.

What makes an atom a gold atom, or a hydrogen atom, or a chlorine atom? Atoms are the smallest components of elements. If you had a really sharp knife (lol) and cut a gold bar in half, then half again and so on, eventually you would come to the atom. It is so small that it cannot be seen, but experiments have shown what it is made of.

It has a nucleus with two particles called a proton and a neutron. Orbitting this nucleus is an even smaller particle called an electron. It is the number of protons in the nucleus that determine the chemical and physical properties of the element.

(Although the reactivity and thus the chemistry of the element is controlled by the number of the tiny electrons that surround it - but an explanation of this would be digressing).

Hydrogen is the lightest element as it has only one proton, and no neutrons. Not surprisingly then, it is a gas (on earth). Next on the list is Helium. It has 2 protons, and 2 neutrons. If you can access a Periodic Table, you will see that the elements follow this pattern of increasing protons. Further along you have gold; it has 79 protons packed into this invisible space. This is a lot of particles, and this is why gold is heavy volume by volume to hydrogen.
All those protons have to weigh something, so a mole of gold weighs 197 grams, compared to the much lighter hydrogen - a mole of which only weighs 1 gram.

The term "mole" means (and there is no simple way to explain it) that you take the number of protons + neutrons and just call it grams. A man called Avogadro then figured out that for every element (or compound etc) one mole of it will always contain
602000000000000000000000 atoms (or molecules etc). Its a way of comparing mass.

I hope this helps a bit!

Answer 3

The universe is full of proton, neutron and electron (as well as a few other sub-atomic particles). These can combine but to be stable they need to combine based on certain rules of physics. Protons have a positive charge, electons a negative charge and neutrons are not charged. Since, positives are attracted to negative charges, electons and protons want to get together, but if too many positives get together they will repel each other and that is where neutron help to stablise the nucleus.

So when an electon and a proton combine they create an atom of hydrogen...your first element.

When two protons combine with two electrons they form the second element Helium (but to allow the proton to combine they need to also have two neutrons present). The rest of the elements follow a similar pattern.

But where did they come from?

This combination of primitive elements starts to get together in space and more and more join up until eventually there is so much hydrogen and other minor elements, that their own gravity and motion creates a sun. This sun through nuclear fusion (joining atoms together) starts to create other elements and eventually after a long time it goes supanova distributing its element into the cosmos. This have been happening since the start of the universe.

This debris from these past suns circle a new sun and eventually form the planets (such as earth) or gas giants (such as jupiter).

Thus by combining protons, electrons and neutrons together more elements can be formed. In theory an infinited number of elements can be created, but eventually the elements become too unstable and break apart (via nuclear fission, radioactive atoms) to be become more stable elements. Mankind has artificially combine different atoms together to get new element but they only survive for factions of a second (not a lot of use for making anything with them!).

Some of the naturally occuring elements are radioactive (eg Uranium) and are slowly decaying to a more stable element (normally lead). Other elements are rare because they are so light that they are actually floating into space (eg Helium) and eventually the earth will no longer contain any helium. Helium was orginally discovered by looking at the specral line of our sun.

Thus, we stand on an earth that has about 92 naturally occuring elements, caused by billions of years of sun making and explosions.

Answer 4

Chemical elements are built up of individual building blocks or particles called atoms. Each chemical element has a specific number of protons in its nucleus (centre). In addition the atoms of an element are built not only of protons, and neutrons (which add mass to the nucleus but do not change the element), and electrons (with a negative charge which balance out the positive charge of the protons). It is a fundamental law of the universe, of how nature works, that the atoms that elements consist of are constructed in that way. If you can accept that (why not? that is after all how it is!) then an atom with one proton will be one element (hydrogen) and an atom with two protons will be different element (helium). These particles protons, neutrons and electrons that make up atoms fit into can only combine in certain ways which we call elements.

Answer 5

elements are made up of atoms. whenever an element is formed it has composition different from the already existing ones. as an atom contains PROTONS, ELECTRONS, NEUTRONS, and other subatomic particles(mesons, quarks, etc) in different proportions to another, whenever it combines with another of its own kind, it forms an element. now, no two different kinds of atoms have the same compositions of all the sub atomic particles(if they have equal electrons/protons, they will have diff. neutrons definitely). furthermore an element contains single kind of atoms. so no two elements are the same. while elements upto atomic no=92 are man made, beyond this, they have been created by mankind by nuclear reactions called transmutation(which involves changing the proton/neutron composition of an atom, converting it into another). that is why there are 120 known elements today.

Answer 6

Some people seem unable to answer the question posed in anything less than a totally over-the-top and irrelevant manner, naming no names....

Different chemical elements are the result of atoms with a different number of protons in the nucleus ( i.e. each element has a particular number of protons in the nucleus of one of its atoms eg carbon has 6 protons, helium 2 etc ).

The chemical behaviour of the elements is the result of the quantum-mechanical system of protons interacting with electrons to form stable patterns of electron movement which we call shells / orbitals.

As to the WHY of it all - well I didn't design the thing, so I don't know.....ask the Almighty ;)

Answer 7

There are different elements because of the way atoms are structured. While the chemical properties are controlled by the cloud of electrons that surround the outside of the atom, the nucleus in the center contains protrons and it is the number of protrons that determines the number of electrons. Indirectly then, the number of protrons determines the chemical properties of atoms as there will be an equal number of electrons as protrons.

As atoms increase their number of protrons they increase the numbers of electrons in a lock step fashion. But the electrons, as described by quantum mechanics, go into different energy levels around the protrons. These energy levels, called orbitals, allow strikingly different chemical properties.

This topic is covered in detail, typically, in the 4th, 5th, and 6th chapters of most high school chemistry books.

Answer 8

If you can hold on I'll get a bus up to East Kilbride. My dad is a retired Chemistry teacher and I will ask him. It will only take me 80 mins. Sorry, he is not feeling well and has gone for a nap...so you will have to wait til Monday when I see all my pals who are Chemistry teachers.

Answer 9

It is just like asking WHY THE UNIVERSE EXISTS... the universe are made up of compounds and element; compounds are made of elements, you know :-)...

Answer 10

Why are we all different.