![]() Under these conditions, the entire gas stops behaving like it is made of individual particles and instead behaves like a single macroscopic quantum system. The so-called fifth state of matter is the Bose-Einstein condensate, which happens only in a very dilute gas of particles known as bosons and when the temperature is close to absolute zero. Pressure, heat, and cold can push substances into configurations with bizarre properties. To find and study them, however, we need to go to extremes. ![]() In the last century, scientists have come to realize that there are more states beyond the ones that we are (more or less) familiar with. Its detailed nature has yet to be determined."For example, Ig Nobel laureates John Mainstone and Thomas Parnell performed a long-term experiment that measures the flow of a piece of pitch – bitumen – over many years, showing that even at room temperature bitumen flows and therefore belongs to the liquid state of matter. Additional complexity in the meaning of matter comes from astronomical observations that began in the 1930s and that show that a large fraction of the universe consists of “dark matter.” This invisible material does not affect light and can be detected only through its gravitational effects. In the quantum view, elementary particles behave both like tiny balls and like waves that spread out in space-a seeming paradox that has yet to be fully resolved. The concept of matter is further complicated by quantum mechanics, whose roots go back to Max Planck’s explanation in 1900 of the properties of electromagnetic radiation emitted by a hot body. Einstein’s theory of gravitation, also known as his theory of general relativity (1916), takes as a central postulate the experimentally observed equivalence of inertial mass and gravitational mass and shows how gravity arises from the distortions that matter introduces into the surrounding space-time continuum. This transformation occurs, for instance, during nuclear fission, in which the nucleus of a heavy element such as uranium splits into two fragments of smaller total mass, with the mass difference released as energy. Einstein’s theory of special relativity (1905) shows that matter (as mass) and energy can be converted into each other according to the famous equation E = m c 2, where E is energy, m is mass, and c is the speed of light. Another universal property is gravitational mass, whereby every physical entity in the universe acts so as to attract every other one, as first stated by Newton and later refined into a new conceptual form by Albert Einstein.ġ,000,000,001 − 1,000,000,000 = 1 See all videos for this articleĪlthough basic ideas about matter trace back to Newton and even earlier to Aristotle’s natural philosophy, further understanding of matter, along with new puzzles, began emerging in the early 20th century. ![]() The mass of a body is a measure of this resistance to change it is enormously harder to set in motion a massive ocean liner than it is to push a bicycle. However, all matter of any type shares the fundamental property of inertia, which-as formulated within Isaac Newton’s three laws of motion-prevents a material body from responding instantaneously to attempts to change its state of rest or motion. Less-clearly defined states of matter include plasmas, which are ionized gases at very high temperatures foams, which combine aspects of liquids and solids and clusters, which are assemblies of small numbers of atoms or molecules that display both atomic-level and bulklike properties. Solids, for example, may be divided into those with crystalline or amorphous structures or into metallic, ionic, covalent, or molecular solids, on the basis of the kinds of bonds that hold together the constituent atoms. These states can be further categorized into subgroups. At ordinary temperatures, for instance, gold is a solid, water is a liquid, and nitrogen is a gas, as defined by certain characteristics: solids hold their shape, liquids take on the shape of the container that holds them, and gases fill an entire container. States of matter See all videos for this articleĭepending on temperature and other conditions, matter may appear in any of several states.
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