Electron Shells: Basics
Shells
- The arrangement of electrons in an atom is called the electronic configuration
- Electrons are arranged around the nucleus in principal energy levels or principal quantum shells
- Principal quantum numbers (n) are used to number the energy levels or quantum shells
- The lower the principal quantum number, the closer the shell is to the nucleus
- The higher the principal quantum number, the higher the energy of the shell
- Each principal quantum number has a fixed number of electrons it can hold
- n = 1 : up to 2 electrons
- n = 2 : up to 8 electrons
- n = 3 : up to 18 electrons
- n = 4 : up to 32 electrons
Electrons are arranged in principal quantum shells, which are numbered by principal quantum numbers
Subshells
- The principal quantum shells are split into subshells which are given the letters s, p and d
- Elements with more than 57 electrons also have an f shell
- The energy of the electrons in the subshells increases in the order s < p < d
- The order of subshells appear to overlap for the higher principal quantum shells as seen in the diagram below:
Electrons are arranged in principal quantum shells, which are numbered by principal quantum numbers
Orbitals
- Subshells contain one or more atomic orbitals
- Orbitals exist at specific energy levels and electrons can only be found at these specific levels, not in between them
- Each atomic orbital can be occupied by a maximum of two electrons
- This means that the number of orbitals in each subshell is as follows:
- s : one orbital (1 x 2 = total of 2 electrons)
- p : three orbitals ( 3 x 2 = total of 6 electrons)
- d : five orbitals (5 x 2 = total of 10 electrons)
- f : seven orbitals (7 x 2 = total of 14 electrons)
- The orbitals have specific 3-D shapes
Representation of orbitals (the dot represents the nucleus of the atom) showing spherical s orbitals (a), p orbitals containing ‘lobes’ along the x, y and z axis
- Note that the shape of the d orbitals is not required at AS Level
An overview of the shells, subshells and orbitals in an atom
Ground state
- The ground state is the most stable electronic configuration of an atom which has the lowest amount of energy
- This is achieved by filling the subshells of energy with the lowest energy first (1s)
- The order of the subshells in terms of increasing energy does not follow a regular pattern at n= 3 and higher
The ground state of an atom is achieved by filling the lowest energy subshells first
