What substance that cannot be broken down into simpler elements?

Answer 1

The substance would be an element.
An element is the simplest and purest form of a chemical substance. It may exist freely as an identity, or in groups of similar elements (elementary molecules), or in association with other elements (compound molecules). But breaking the element would yield the subatomic particles that are all common to every chemical substance.

Answer 2

Since this is a question under the category of chemistry, the answer is a chemical element, which cannot be broken down into smaller substances by chemical means. Elements actually can be broken down into sub-atomic particles, but that takes us out of the realm of chemistry, into nuclear physics.

Answer 3

The conventional answer is "an element".
One contributor proposed "atom"; another noted that "an atom can be broken down to its parts which include electrons, protons and neutrons. neutrinos are now the smallest substance [sic]"

However, it is doubtful that protons, electrons, neutrinos, neutrons and the other atomic particles should be considered "substances", because they can not exist in pure volumes of visible size.


Another less confident earlier contributor wrote correctly "Elements are the answer you're looking for. While they can be broken down into the atoms they're comprised of, elements are the most basic building blocks of all substances. [punctuation slightly improved]"

Answer 4

The element cannot be broken down into anything simpler, except if there is an nuclear reaction

Answer 5

This is the atom, unbreakable by chemical procedures.

Answer 6

An element.

Answer 7

mass

Answer 8

Elements