Atoms and Elements
What are Elements?
Elements are substances that can not be chemically broken down into simpler substances. There are more than 100 known elements. Most of the first 92 known elements are found in nature. The rest have been made in labs by scientists. Most elements are solid at room temperature. That means the particles are tightly packed together with barely any space between them.. Some examples are iron, zinc, lead, silver, and gold. Other elements like mercury and bromine are liquids at room temperature. Their particles are not as tightly packed together as the particles in a solid and have more space between them. . Still others like oxygen, hydrogen, helium and neon are gasses at room temperature. The particles in a gas are much are much more free and the spaces between them is huge.
All matter is made up of elements. Some matter is made of only one element. Have you ever seen a bar of gold . That would be an example of matter made of just one element -gold. We call that pure. Other matter is made of different elements that combine chemically. For example if oxygen and hydrogen is combined chemically we have water.
by Monica B.
