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Feedback: Your answer about seeing atoms
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Feedback: Your answer about seeing atoms
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thedoc
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Feedback: Your answer about seeing atoms
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30/10/2015 13:50:02 »
Sandra Richardson asked the Naked Scientists:
I asked Google if we can see atoms. Your site page says yes, but you are not really seeing the atom. You are only seeing the electron field around the atom. That sounds so - I do not know what - misleading? Either you can see the atom or you cannot. How do you even know there is an atom in the electron field? Your answer should have been, no, as of this date no one has seen an atom.
What do you think?
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Last Edit: 30/10/2015 13:50:02 by _system
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chiralSPO
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Re: Feedback: Your answer about seeing atoms
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30/10/2015 18:27:12 »
Technically we only see light (and a small range of frequencies at that!). Our eyes and brains interpret the light that falls into our pupils, and we "see" objects or whatever else we are looking at.
It is impossible to "see" anything that is so much smaller than the wavelengths of light that our eyes are sensitive to (although there are ways around it like this:
https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/chemistry/laureates/2014/popular-chemistryprize2014.pdf
)
We can, however use other methods of observation to get much, much better resolution--to the point that we can distinguish single atoms. Electron microscopy (TEM, STEM and SEM) and atomic force microscopy now have roughly atomic resolution. These techniques detect the electrons in the atoms, but we can also observe the nuclei by means such as neutron diffraction. (And, just to be clear, there is no atom inside the electrons, the electrons are part of the atom!)
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