THE EVOLVING UNDERSTANDING OF CHEMICAL TRANSFORMATIONS AND ATOMIC ARCHITECTURE

• Dr. Reem A. Al-Mansoori

  Department of Chemistry, Qatar University, Qatar

  Author

• Dr. Lucia Benitez

  Faculty of Exact Sciences, University of Buenos Aires, Argentina

  Author

Have you ever wondered how everything around us changes and interacts? Our journey to understand chemical reactions and the tiny building blocks called atoms has been a fascinating adventure, transforming from ancient ideas and mystical alchemy into the precise science we know today. This article takes you through that incredible historical journey, highlighting the big "aha!" moments and conceptual leaps that have shaped our current knowledge. We'll start with a cornerstone idea: the conservation of mass, a revolutionary insight that first gave us a way to measure and understand chemical change. Then, we'll dive into how atomic theory developed, from John Dalton's early ideas of unbreakable atoms to the complex quantum models that describe the even tinier particles inside. We'll meticulously explore how we figured out atomic structure, how Dmitri Mendeleev beautifully organized the elements, the different ways atoms stick together, how we measure the amounts in reactions, the energy involved in these changes, and the dynamic speed at which they happen. We'll pay special tribute to giants like Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier, John Dalton, J.J. Thomson, Ernest Rutherford, Niels Bohr, and Dmitri Mendeleev – their combined genius laid the essential groundwork for the massive and intricate world of modern chemistry. Plus, this paper will introduce you to some new, intriguing theoretical equations about atomic states and energy changes, fresh from recent research, fitting them into our broader discussion of how atoms move and transform. Our goal is to give you a deep and rich appreciation for how our understanding of matter's transformations has grown, from what we can see with our eyes to the mysterious quantum realm, influencing virtually every part of technology, biology, and the natural world.

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