What are the charges of each part of the atom?
1 Answer
The massive core of the atom has an opposite electric charge to the electrons, which orbit the atom.
Explanation:
The massive nuclear core, the nucleus, contains charged particles, protons, conceived to have a positive charge, and neutrons, conceived to have a neutral charge. Around the core orbit various numbers of negatively charged particles, electrons, whose mass is negligible compared to that of the nuclear core.
Electrons, and charged nuclear particles HAVE opposite electric charges. I have written before that, were we to redefine fundamental notions of electromagnetism, we would assign the electron a positive charge, rather than a negative one. It would save generations of chemists and physicists from getting the wrong sign on their answer simply because they counted an odd number rather than even number of electrons.
