Atoms

[sudu]

I have been told that atoms cannot be created or destroyed although this does not make a lot of sense to me. Howver if this is true how is the population increasing? Is this to do with people dying, decomposing this becoming part of the soil and where plants grow which are eaten in a simplified version?

Thanks!!

[gen2]

Yes, it is called recycling. We are involved in many cycles including the 'carbon cycle', nitrogen cycle, water cycle etc.

[Gef]

Atoms can be created and destroyed but only under extreme conditions (nuclear fusion and fission). Under "normal" conditions atoms are recycled as gen2 says.

[loudickson71]

We are made from small atoms secreted by the stork during transit. Where they get em, still a mystery.

[kempie]

Are atoms really created and destroyed during fission and fusion, or are they converted through the addition or removal of subatomic particles?

I suppose it all depends on the definitions of create and destroy.

[fo3nix]

kempie: yes, fission and fusion is just a change from one atom to another (gaing/losing nuclei basically).

other particles can be created from other particles being annihilated (the basis of particle accelerators).

and of course you have virtual particles.

[Gef]

Sorry to disagree kempie but during fission you end up with more atoms than you started with since a uranium (or plutonium) atom splits into 2 other atoms. The opposite is true for fusion as two hydrogen atoms turn into a helium atom.

[kempie]

...disagree with what Gef, I didn't give an opinion. I posed a question and brought up a point about definitions.

In an absolute sense create means "make from nothing", however it can also mean "produce from existing components". Similar definitions are applicable to the term destroy.

During fission/fusion atoms are changed even if that means that 1 becomes 2, or even more, and vice versa. This does not mean that the subatomic particles have in any way appeared or disappeared, the nett effect is no change in number.

Now if you were to alter the argument slighty and make it about matter and antimatter...

[Gef]

Sorry kempie, I misread your reply as a statement rather than a question. In terms of the original question then yes, new atoms can be created by re-arranging the sub-atomic particles of other atoms. In the same way atoms can be destroyed.