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Valency Electrons

Posted 15 months ago|11 comments|521 views
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Abelink
Carbonado, WA
I wandered out of the mist the other day and found myself in a library. As science has changed since I was alive, I thought I would go and browse the science section. Ramdomly flicking through some of the books, lovely pictures, I came upon something called a valency electron. It appears that a valency electron is in the outer part, of the shell, of an atom of an element. I did not know atoms had shells? Anyway, some elements always have the same amount of valence electrons. I read that hydrogen has one, ordinary oxygen has two, so does calcium. The electrons are reponsible for creating bonds with other atoms. It also appears that these valency electrons are sometimes shared, I can see that. But other times they are lost when an Ion or compound is formed.

Having been in the mist for some years my mind wanders every now and again, but how can an electron get lost, where does it go. Are there some atoms that go round stealing these electrons or have they just been mislayed? If another atom gets hold of one of these lost valency electrons the surley the atom's structure changes and it become a part, of a part of something else. So for example if a calcium atom was wandering around and it lost one of its two valency electrons, would that atom then change into oxygen?

This has very serious ramifications, somewhere there is a big pile of homeless valency electrons, if these electrons were found and put to use, would everything change, as the atomic stucture will have changed, as it has been added to, and the atoms that make up an object will all be changed so does the complete object change as well? If that is the case Icould get up one morning as a human being and be a table and chairs by the evening. Anyone who can help please comment.
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georgeberaobama
georgeberaobama
Blakely Island, WA
15 months ago: Hello Abe, you old fool.
Valence electrons are those electrons in the outer shell of a given atom. The amount of valence electrons in the outer shell determines how atoms interact with each other. An atom is said to have a closed shell when it has enough valence electrons in the outer shell in order to make it stable. Conversely, it is said to have an open shell when there are not enough valence electrons to make it stable. An atom with an open shell is constantly trying to reach stability, forming one of the foundations of many chemical reactions.

Abelink
Abelink
Carbonado, WA
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Abelink
Abelink
Carbonado, WA
15 months ago: Hi George, want some tips?

You did not answer my question, typical of politicians of today. So you say that when the shell is open it can be unstable as there are not egnough valence electrons. My Questions are how are they lost, where do they go when they are lost, how does an unstable atom get around to finding the valence electrons?
Paper Tiger
Paper Tiger
England
15 months ago:
Read and learn Abe. To understand how an atom reaches stability it's vital to know the function and importance of valence electrons. Without these electrons, the atom simply could not exist. It provides a variety of functions that enable it to create a foundation for chemical bonds.

We know that water consists of two hydrogen elements and one oxygen element. We must drink water to survive. It's necessary to use water in our everyday lives. It's essential to our living. But with all that being said, I highly doubt many people understand the complex procedure that had to take place to make this water. For water to achieve stability and form a covalent bond, oxygen has to gain two atoms, while hydrogen has to gain or lose one atom. The two hydrogen atoms and the oxygen share the electrons, which, in turn, form a water molecule.
Water is one of many interesting examples of how valence electrons are at work in our world today. Take a look around you. Our earth is simply filled with endless beautifully complex creations, much to the thanks of the work of valence electrons. Having said that I have no idea whatsoever how they get lost, where they go, and how do other atoms pick them up?
Abelink
Abelink
Carbonado, WA
15 months ago: Other atoms prefer to give their electrons to another atom, rather than sharing the electron. Sodium, for instance, has only one lonely electron in its valence shell. If it could just get rid of that one electron, then it could get rid of that shell, and the next one in would be full. But chlorine has seven electrons in its valence shell, and it needs eight to fill it up. So whenever sodium gets near chlorine, the sodium atoms give their extra electron to the chlorine atoms. You might think they would then go on about their own business. But the electrons still hold onto their original atoms too, so the sodium and chlorine atoms form a molecule together called sodium chloride - or salt.
Abelink
Abelink
Carbonado, WA
15 months ago: I was very confused so I went back to the mist and ask a few questions. There I met a spirit named J.J Thompson. This is what he told me. "A valence electron is like a friend that never goes away. It is a bonder that connects with you and never lets go. This is just one of the many jobs it has to do for an atom. A lot of other jobs are just the same as for a regular electron. Just like electrons valence electrons are negatively charged and they both rotate around the atom. A valence electron is also on the outside shell of an atom. A shell is like a level or an orbit for an electron to go around. You could say that electrons and the atom are like one big solar system.


One of my wondering questions about the valence electron is how fast can it go? The answer to the question is as fast as you can get them going! Well not exactly. One of the facts I discovered is that it can as fast as the speed of light (300,000,000) It can go even faster if you add more energy to it. For example,with just over 220,000 eV, (eV stands for a convenient unit of energy called the "electron volt) you could get the electron to go as much as 90% of the speed of light.


Remember in the last paragraph when I told you about the outer shell of an atom? Well now I am going to tell you why the valence electron is on the outside shell of the atom in the first place. You see the one thing more than anything else in the world that valence electrons love to do is bond. When two valence electrons bond it fells like they are best friends That are together forever.


There are two main types of bonding that valence electrons love to use. The first one is called covalent bonding. Covalent bonding is used to make two atoms become molecules by sharing the electron. An example of covalent bonding is water. Also known as H2O. Water is made up of two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom. The two hydrogen atoms need one more electron to become a molecule. while the oxygen needs just two more electrons to become a molecule of oxygen. This is where the valence electron comes in. The valence electron will use a magnetic force that will bring the three atoms together. When this happens the atoms will combine together and form what we know as water.


The next type of bonding that valence electrons use is called ionic boning. They call it ionic because this type of bonding uses ions to form molecules in stead of using the way I described with covalent bonding. I know some of you might be scratching your head saying what in the world is an ion? So I will tell you. An ion is an incomplete atom that is positively charged. It is positively charged because there are not enough electrons to even out the positive and negative balanced energy between protons and electrons. Sometimes atoms do not have enough electrons to become anything. This is really sad for them because an atom's dream is always to become molecules. Ionic bonding is when one atom needs to borrow an electron.


An example of ionic bonding is salt. Salt in its scientific term is called sodium chloride. Salt is made from sodium and chlorine atoms. In this example the chlorine atom needs to borrow or "steal" the extra electron that the sodium atom has. The chlorine atom needs to borrow the extra valence electron or the molecule cannot be made. For some strange reason atoms love having eight valence electrons. No one really knows why but they just do. Right now the sodium atom only has one valence electron and the chlorine has seven. In order to make them both become molecules they have to share the electron and bond together to make two new atoms and form them into a salt molecule.


By now we should all know that atoms come together in order to make new molecules. But what joins the atoms together? What is the "glue" that holds the whole thing? This is another way covalent bonding could be used. To find out how the molecules are made
BadCyborg
BadCyborg
San Antonio, TX
15 months ago: Can you tell us all who your dealer is, Abe? Looks like the s**t he's selling you is PRIMO.

I studied chemistry last in '67-'68 but I do remember Constance Thompson's lessons about "cloud model". I also recall that the essential nature of an atom is determined by the number of protons in the nucleus. Normally the number of neutrons equals the number of protons - but not always. Hydrogen normally doesn't have a neutron. But deuterium has one and tritium (both isotopes of hydrogen) DO have neutrons- one and two respectively. Anyhow under the right conditions an atom can lose an electron from its valence shell and thus the atom will have a net positive charge. Sometimes an atom can PIUCK UP an electron and be net negative.

If all the clouds in the outermost (valence) shell of an atom are full - i.e. have two electrons in them - that atom will not react with anything else. Hydrogen has 1 half-filled electron cloud so it is quite reactive. Helium has 2 electrons in its single cloud and reacts with pretty much nothing. Oxygen has 2 half-empty clouds in its valence shell so is pretty reactive. Carbon (and all the elements in its column of the periodic table) has 4 half empty clouds and can combine with a lot of things.

They used to say that electric current involved the actual movement of electrons. In fact current was defined as a given number of coulombs of electrons (and I don't remember how many are in a coulomb) moving past a fixed point in a specified amount of time. One ampere is one coulomb of electrons moving past a given point in one second. But now they say that electrons don't really move in a conductor. Maybe not but in a big vacuum tube (like a CRT for a television) electrons jump a rather significant amount of empty space. Of course to get an electron (normally a quite sedentary beast) to jump across several inches of space you have to kick it in the a** with several thousand volts - enough to make you or me jump several FEET! lol
Abelink
Abelink
Carbonado, WA
15 months ago: Good morning Mr Bad, I get my s**t from Richard Milhouse Nixon he has a condo near me.

Any thanks for the info, it's as clear as mud. I have a meeting with Eddison this week and all he goes on about is valence electrons. With my new found information I will be able to heckle him without looking stupid.
Abelink
Abelink
Carbonado, WA
15 months ago: Thanks Bad
It's as clear as mud now.
georgeberaobama
georgeberaobama
Blakely Island, WA
15 months ago: I've tried to submit this a few times, if it all turns up at once don't call me stupid.
georgeberaobama
georgeberaobama
Blakely Island, WA
15 months ago: Good day Abe, you old goat.
If you see Richard Milhouse Nixon in the mist, kick him in the bollocks for me?
Paper Tiger
Paper Tiger
England
15 months ago: Gorge,

Can it be safely said that you do not agree how Nixon ran in office?

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