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Electric charge is a conserved property: the net charge of an isolated system, the quantity of positive charge minus the amount of negative charge, cannot change. Electric charge is carried by subatomic particles. In ordinary matter, negative charge is carried by electrons, and positive charge is carried by the protons in the nuclei of atoms ...
The charge of an electron is considered to be negative by convention and this charge is equal and opposite to the charge of a proton, which is considered to be positive by convention. The net charge of an ion is not zero because its total number of electrons is unequal to its total number of protons.
Ionization (or ionisation specifically in Britain, Ireland, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand) is the process by which an atom or a molecule acquires a negative or positive charge by gaining or losing electrons, often in conjunction with other chemical changes.
An example is the ammonium cation of 8 valence electrons (5 from nitrogen, 4 from hydrogens, minus 1 electron for the cation's positive charge): Drawing Lewis structures with electron pairs as dashes emphasizes the essential equivalence of bond pairs and lone pairs when counting electrons and moving bonds onto atoms.
Charge number (denoted z) is a quantized and dimensionless quantity derived from electric charge, with the quantum of electric charge being the elementary charge (e, constant). The charge number equals the electric charge ( q , in coulombs ) divided by the elementary charge: z = q / e .
This does not mean that individual positive and negative charges cannot be created or destroyed. Electric charge is carried by subatomic particles such as electrons and protons. Charged particles can be created and destroyed in elementary particle reactions.
If a body has more or fewer electrons than are required to balance the positive charge of the nuclei, then that object has a net electric charge. When there is an excess of electrons, the object is said to be negatively charged. When there are fewer electrons than the number of protons in nuclei, the object is said to be positively charged.
Ionic compounds generally have a high melting point, depending on the charge of the ions they consist of. The higher the charges the stronger the cohesive forces and the higher the melting point. They also tend to be soluble in water; the stronger the cohesive forces, the lower the solubility. [3]