Chapter 2: The Chemical Level of Organization Flashcards
What is chemistry?
The science of the structure and interactions of matter.
What is matter?
- Anything that occupies space and has mass.
Exists in 3 states:
1. Solid.
2. Liquid.
3. Gas.
What is mass?
The amount of matter in any object, which does not change.
What is weight?
Force of gravity acting on matter, which does change.
What is a solid state of matter?
- Are compact.
- Have a definite shape and volume.
- Example: Bones and teeth.
What is a liquid state of matter?
- Have a definite volume.
- Assume the shape of their container.
- Example: Blood plasma.
What is a gas state of matter?
- Have neither a definite shape nor volume.
- Example: Oxygen and carbon dioxide.
What is a chemical element?
- Each element is a substance that cannot be split into a simpler substance by ordinary chemical means.
- Total of 118 elements.
- 92 occuring naturally on Earth.
What is a chemical symbol?
- One or two letters of the element name in English, Latin or another language.
- Example: H for hydrogen, C for carbon, O for oxygen, N for nitrogen, Ca for calcium, Na for sodium.
How many chemical elements are normally present in your body?
- 26 different chemical elements.
- Consists of the major elements, lesser elements and trace elements.
What are the major elements in the body?
- Constitutes about 96% of the body’s mass.
Consists of 4 elements:
1. Oxygen.
2. Carbon.
3. Hydrogen.
4. Nitrogen.
What are the lesser elements in the body?
- Contribute about 3.6% of the body’s mass.
Consists of 8 elements:
1. Calcium.
2. Phosphorus.
3. Potassium.
4. Sulfur.
5. Sodium.
6. Chlorine.
7. Magnesium.
8. Iron.
What are the trace elements in the body?
- Present in tiny amounts.
- Account for remaining body mass, about 0.4%.
Consists of 14 elements:
1. Aluminum.
2. Boron.
3. Chromium.
4. Cobalt.
5. Copper.
6. Fluorine.
7. Iodine.
8. Manganese.
9. Molybdenum.
10. Selenium.
11. Silicon.
12. Tin.
13. Vanadium.
14. Zinc.
Define the major element oxygen.
- 65% of the total body mass.
- Part of water and many organic (carbon-containing) molecules.
- Used to generate ATP.
Define the major element carbon.
- 18.5% of the total body mass.
- Forms the backbone chains and rings of all organic molecules; carbohydrates, lipids (fats), proteins, nucleic acids (DNA and RNA).
Define the major element hydrogen.
- 9.5% of the total body mass.
- Constituent of water and most organic molecules.
- Ionized form (H+) makes body fluids more acidic.
Define the major element nitrogen.
- 3.2% of the total body mass.
- Component of all proteins and nucleic acids.
Define an atom.
- Smallest units of matter that retain the properties and characteristics of the element.
- Extremely small.
What is a subatomic particle?
- A particle that composes an atom.
- Dozens of different subatomic particles, only 3 types important for understanding chemical reactions in human body:
1. Protons.
2. Neutrons.
3. Electrons.
What is the nucleus of an atom?
- Dense central core, contains positively charged protons and uncharged (neutral) neutrons.
- Tiny, negatively charged electrons move about in a large space surrounding the nucleus.
What is an electron shell?
- Negatively charged electrons form a negatively charged “cloud” that envelops nucleus.
- Depicted as simple circles around nucleus.
- Each shell can hold a specific number of electrons.
- Fill with electrons in a specific order, beginning with first shell.
What is the first electron shell?
- Nearest the nucleus.
- Never holds more than 2 electrons.
What is the second electron shell?
- Holds a maximum of 8 electrons.
What is the third electron shell?
- Holds a maximum of 18 electrons.
Why is an atom electrically neutral?
- Number of electrons in an atom of an element always equals number of protons.
- Negatively charged electrons and positively charged protons balance each other.
What is the atomic number of an atom?
- Number of protons in the nucleus of an atom.
- Atoms of different elements have different atomic numbers because they have different numbers of protons.
What is the mass number of an atom?
- Number of protons and neutrons in an atom.
What is an isotope?
- Atoms of an element that have different numbers of neutrons and therefore, different mass numbers.
What is a radioactive isotope (radioisotopes)?
- Unstable; their nuclei decay into a stable configuration.
- As they decay, atoms emit radiation (either subatomic particles or packets of energy) and in process transform into a different element.
Examples of atomic structures of stable atoms:
-
Hydrogen (H): 1 proton, 1 electron shell.
Atomic number = 1
Mass number = 1 or 2
Atomic mass = 1.01 -
Carbon (C): 6 protons, 6 neutrons, 2 electron shells.
Atomic number = 6
Mass number = 12 or 13
Atomic mass = 12.01
Examples of atomic structures of stable atoms:
-
Nitrogen (N): 7 protons, 7 neutrons, 2 electron shells.
Atomic number = 7
Mass number = 14 or 15
Atomic mass = 14.01 -
Oxygen (O): 8 protons, 8 neutrons, 2 electron shells.
Atomic number = 8
Mass number = 16, 17 or 18
Atomic mass = 16.00
What is the atomic mass of an atom?
- Average mass of all the naturally occurring isotopes.
- Atomic mass of an element is close to mass number of its most abundant isotope.
What is the half life of an isotope?
- Time required for half of the radioactive atoms in a sample of that isotope to decay into more stable form.
- As fast as fraction of a second or as slow as millions of years.
What is a dalton?
- Standard unit for measuring mass of atoms and their subatomic particles.
- Aka an atomic mass unit.
- Neutron has a mass of 1.008 daltons.
- Proton has a mass of 1.007 daltons.
- Electron has a mass of 0.0005 daltos.
What is an ion?
- Aom that has positive or negative charge because it has unequal numbers of protons and electrons.
- Atom becomes an ion if it either gives up or gains electrons.
What is ionization?
- Process of giving up or gaining electrons.
- Ion of an atom is symbolized by writing its chemical symbol followed by number of positive or negative charges.
What is a molecule?
- When two or more atoms share electrons.
- Molecule may consist of two atoms of same kind, such as an oxygen molecule.
What is a compound?
- Substance that contains atoms of two or more different elements.
- Most atoms in body are joined into compounds.
- Examples: water (H2O) and sodium chloride (NaCl), common table salt, are compounds.
What is a free radical?
- Atom or group of atoms with an unpaired electron in outermost shell.
- Example: Superoxide (formed by addition of an electron to an oxygen molecule).
- Unpaired electron makes free radical unstable, highly reactive and destructive to nearby molecules.
- Become stable by either giving up unpaired electron to, or taking on an electron from, another molecule.
What is a chemical bond?
- Forces that hold together the atoms of a molecule or a compound.
- Likelihood that atom will form a chemical bond with another atom depends on number of electrons in its outermost shell.
What is a valence shell?
- An atoms outermost shell.
- Atom with valence shell holding 8 electrons is chemically stable (unlikely to form chemical bonds with other atoms).
- Most biologically important elements do not have 8 electrons in their valence shells.
Define the octet rule.
- When 2 or more atoms interact in ways that produce chemically stable arrangement of 8 valence electrons for each atom.
What is an ionic bond?
- Force of attraction that holds together ions with opposite charges.
- Positively and negatively charged ions are attracted to one another.
- Mainly found in teeth and bones.
What is a cation?
- Positively charged ion.
What is an anion?
- Negatively charged ion.
What is an electrolyte?
- Iconic compound, breaks apart into positive and negative ions in solution.
- Most ions in body are dissolved in body fluids as electrolytes.
- Their solutions can conduct an electric current.
What are common ions found in the body?
Cations: Hydrogen (H+), Sodium (Na+), Potassium (K+), Ammonium (NH4+), Magnesium (Mg2+), Calcium (Ca2+), Iron (II) (Fe2+), Iron (III) (Fe3+).
Anions: Fluoride (F-), Chloride (Cl-), Iodine (I-), Hydroxide (OH-), Bicarbonate (HCO3-), Oxide (O2-), Sulfate (SO4 2-), Phosphate (PO4 3-).
What is a covalent bond?
- When 2 or more atoms share electrons rather than gaining/losing them.
- Atoms form a covalently bonded molecule by sharing 1, 2 or 3 pairs of valence electrons.
- The larger the number of electron pairs shared between 2 atoms, the stronger the covalent bond.
- Most common chemical bond in body.
- Can form between atoms of same element or different elements.
What is a single covalent bond?
- When 2 atoms share 1 electron pair.
- Example: Molecule of hydrogen forms when 2 hydrogen atoms share their single valence electrons, which allows both atoms to have a full valence shell at least part of the time.
What is a double covalent bond?
- Results when 2 atoms share 2 pairs of electrons.
- Example: Oxygen molecule.
What is a triple covalent bond?
- Results when 2 atoms share 3 pairs of electrons.
- Example: Molecule of nitrogen.
What is a nonpolar covalent bond?
- Two atoms share the electrons equally.
- One atom does not attract shared electrons more strongly than other atom.
- Bonds between 2 identical atoms are always nonpolar covalent bonds.
What is a polar covalent bond?
- Sharing of electrons between two atoms is unequal.
- Nucleus of one atom attracts shared electrons more strongly than nucleus of other atom.
- When polar covalent bonds form, resulting molecule has partial negative charge near the atom that attracts electrons more strongly.
- This atom has greater electronegativity (power to attract electrons to itself).
What is a hydrogen bond?
- Forms when a hydrogen atom with partial positive charge attracts the partial negative charge of neighboring electronegative atoms, most often larger oxygen or nitrogen atoms.
- Result from attraction of oppositely charged parts of molecules.
- Weak bonds, cannot bind atoms into molecules.
- Establish important links between molecules or between different parts of a large molecule.
What is surface tension in hydrogen bonds?
- Hydrogen bonds that link neighboring water molecules give water considerable cohesion.
- Measure of the difficulty of stretching/breaking the surface of a liquid.
- Boundary between water and air, waters surface tension is very high as water molecules are more attracted to one another than to molecules in air.
Define a chemical reaction.
- Occurs when new bonds form/old bonds break between atoms.
- Foundation of all life processes.
- Interactions of valence electrons are basis of all chemical reactions.
- Starting substances are know as reactants.
- Ending substances are known as products.
Define metabolism.
- All the chemical reactions occurring in the body.
Define energy (in relation to chemical reactions).
- The capacity to do work.
- Consists of 2 principal forms of energy:
1. Potential energy (energy stored by matter due to its position).
2. Kinetic energy (energy associated with matter in motion). - Each chemical reaction involves energy changes.
What is chemical energy?
- Form of potential energy that is stored in the bonds of compounds and molecules.
- Total amount of energy present at beginning and end of a chemical reaction is the same.
What is the law of conservation of energy?
- Energy can be neither created nor destroyed.
- May be converted from one form to another.
- Generally releases heat, some of which is used to maintain normal body temperature.
What is an exergonic reaction?
- Release more energy than they absorb.
What is an endergonic reaction?
- Absorb more energy than they release.
What is activation energy?
- Energy needed to break chemical bonds in reactant molecules so reaction can start.
- Particles of matter are continuously moving, colliding with one another.
- Sufficiently forceful collision can disrupt movement of valence electrons, causing an existing chemical bond to break/new one to form.