why does a atomic particle orbit the nucleus of a atom such as electrons and such?

Question

has anyone proven that the electron is slowing in its speed of orbit around the nucleus ? if not ! does this not prove the concept of perpectual motion and defy the truth of thermal dynamics ! what about string theory! and the concept of space as a vacume !creating energy ! is space slowing down or accelerating? please inform me thanks

Answer 1

I think what really needs explaining here is what is meant by "perpetual motion". If the meaning of the phrase exactly matched according to the definitions of the individual words, then perpetual motion would be the most common thing in the universe and include electrons orbiting nuclei and planets orbiting stars. These things will happen "perpetually", unless you try do one thing which the more common meaning of the phrase requests - extract energy. An electron orbiting a nucleus both contains an amount of potential energy, and, since it orbits in a perfect vacuum, does not expend any of it's energy in it's perpetual "falling" around the nucleus. Planets orbiting stars are almost as perpetual, but due to the not-quite-perfect vacuum of space, do actually give up some of their potential energy continuously when colliding with atoms in space.

Remember that objects under the influence of fields, just because the may be moving in orbits, are not necessarily preforming work. It is the same as a mass moving through interstellar space in a straight line. The mass is moving, but is not performing work unless it collides with another object, and in which case, energy will be conserved, but not created (or destroyed, for that matter), in the altered trajectories of the 2 objects.

The goal of "perpetual motion" as more commonly used is to be able to extract energy from a device without affecting the potential or kinetic energy within it. Clearly impossible. The only apparently possible way to do this is to somehow build a device that extracts energy from an alternate universe, yet even then, doing so will lessen the energy from the alternate universe. It would be much simpler to extract energy from more conventional means.

Answer 2

Phew that's a lot to answer in one question.

The orbit is caused by the Coulomb Force.
I do not know that anyone has ever measured either an orbital decay or a slowdown of speed of an electron in an atom, but it would be a good graduate dissertation.
If you think non-classically, the electron is not always in the orbit but is sometimes in different parts of the atom. It even has a chance (quantum mechanically) to be in the nucleus.As far as perpetual motion, you would have to prove that there is no other unseen force keeping the electron in the atom, and we all know about the existence of other sub atomic particles such as leptons, quarks, baryons, etc, that play sometimes unknown roles in the microverse. You would also have to perform this experiment at absolute zero with absolutely no light (heat) or other matter around so that you could say without a doubt that there were no other exterior forces adding energy to the system to keep the electron in orbit.

Answer 3

The picture of the atom you have in mind is taught as a simple model. It is misleading. An electron isn't a 'thing' like a ball bearing is. In an atom, an electron is better understood as energy of a particular wavelength, depending on it's quantum state.

In any case, this is how conflict with thermal dynamics is resolved. Electrons can and do gain and lose energy, but they can only do it in certain sized packets (that's the quantum in quantum physics). Since there are only certain slots they can fill in any particular atom, if an electron were to lose energy, it would have to lose an entire packet and move to a different place in that atom. If that place is filled already, there is no slot for the electron to go to and nothing happens, no entropy available.

I couldn't quite make out the rest of your questions, sorry.

Answer 4

"such as electrons and such" ? the electrons are the only thing, and no it doesn't disprove concept of perpetual motion, that's like saying it's disproved because the universe is one big perpetual motion machine, and the rest of your questions are hard to understand lol