Lone pairIn chemistry, a lone pair refers to a pair of valence electrons that are not shared with another atom in a covalent bond and is sometimes called an unshared pair or non-bonding pair. Lone pairs are found in the outermost electron shell of atoms. They can be identified by using a Lewis structure. Electron pairs are therefore considered lone pairs if two electrons are paired but are not used in chemical bonding. Thus, the number of electrons in lone pairs plus the number of electrons in bonds equals the number of valence electrons around an atom.
Ionization energyIn physics and chemistry, ionization energy (IE) (American English spelling), ionisation energy (British English spelling) is the minimum energy required to remove the most loosely bound electron of an isolated gaseous atom, positive ion, or molecule. The first ionization energy is quantitatively expressed as X(g) + energy ⟶ X+(g) + e− where X is any atom or molecule, X+ is the resultant ion when the original atom was stripped of a single electron, and e− is the removed electron.
Ionic crystalIn chemistry, an ionic crystal is a crystalline form of an ionic compound. They are solids consisting of ions bound together by their electrostatic attraction into a regular lattice. Examples of such crystals are the alkali halides, including potassium fluoride (KF), potassium chloride (KCl), potassium bromide (KBr), potassium iodide (KI), sodium fluoride (NaF). Sodium chloride (NaCl) has a 6:6 co-ordination. The properties of NaCl reflect the strong interactions that exist between the ions.
Physical cosmologyPhysical cosmology is a branch of cosmology concerned with the study of cosmological models. A cosmological model, or simply cosmology, provides a description of the largest-scale structures and dynamics of the universe and allows study of fundamental questions about its origin, structure, evolution, and ultimate fate. Cosmology as a science originated with the Copernican principle, which implies that celestial bodies obey identical physical laws to those on Earth, and Newtonian mechanics, which first allowed those physical laws to be understood.
Gravitational energyGravitational energy or gravitational potential energy is the potential energy a massive object has in relation to another massive object due to gravity. It is the potential energy associated with the gravitational field, which is released (converted into kinetic energy) when the objects fall towards each other. Gravitational potential energy increases when two objects are brought further apart. For two pairwise interacting point particles, the gravitational potential energy is given by where and are the masses of the two particles, is the distance between them, and is the gravitational constant.
Equipartition theoremIn classical statistical mechanics, the equipartition theorem relates the temperature of a system to its average energies. The equipartition theorem is also known as the law of equipartition, equipartition of energy, or simply equipartition. The original idea of equipartition was that, in thermal equilibrium, energy is shared equally among all of its various forms; for example, the average kinetic energy per degree of freedom in translational motion of a molecule should equal that in rotational motion.
Skeletal formulaThe skeletal formula, or line-angle formula or shorthand formula, of an organic compound is a type of molecular structural formula that serves as a shorthand representation of a molecule's bonding and some details of its molecular geometry. A skeletal formula shows the skeletal structure or skeleton of a molecule, which is composed of the skeletal atoms that make up the molecule. It is represented in two dimensions, as on a piece of paper. It employs certain conventions to represent carbon and hydrogen atoms, which are the most common in organic chemistry.
Chemical symbolChemical symbols are the abbreviations used in chemistry for chemical elements, functional groups and chemical compounds. Element symbols for chemical elements normally consist of one or two letters from the Latin alphabet and are written with the first letter capitalised. Earlier symbols for chemical elements stem from classical Latin and Greek vocabulary. For some elements, this is because the material was known in ancient times, while for others, the name is a more recent invention.
Simple harmonic motionIn mechanics and physics, simple harmonic motion (sometimes abbreviated ()) is a special type of periodic motion an object experiences due to a restoring force whose magnitude is directly proportional to the distance of the object from an equilibrium position and acts towards the equilibrium position. It results in an oscillation that is described by a sinusoid which continues indefinitely (if uninhibited by friction or any other dissipation of energy).
Scalar potentialIn mathematical physics, scalar potential, simply stated, describes the situation where the difference in the potential energies of an object in two different positions depends only on the positions, not upon the path taken by the object in traveling from one position to the other. It is a scalar field in three-space: a directionless value (scalar) that depends only on its location. A familiar example is potential energy due to gravity.