The atomic mases of the elements are not whole-value numbers because of the existence of quarks?

Answer 1

First: Atomic Mass if the weighted average of the naturally occuring isotopes of an element. So the averge is un likely to be a whole number.

Second: Atomic mass of an isotope is NOT the sum of the protons and neutrons, thats the mass number. A proton's or a neutron's mass is not exactly 1. Electrons do have mass. So even though one isotope of oxygen has 8 protons and 8 neutrons, the atomic mass is not 16.

Answer 2

In a round-about way this is true. Neutrons and protons are made up of quarks. Protons have 2 up quarks and 1 down quark while neutrons have 1 up quark and 2 down quarks. The reason that the reported mass of an elements is not a whole number is largely because it is an average of he masses of all the isotopes of the element - weighted by the fraction of each isotope in nature. The differences in the weights of the isotopes is due to differences in the number of neutrons in the nucleus - and since neutrons are made up of quarks - yeah - the existence of quarks makes the existence of neutrons possible which makes different isotopes possible which makes it possible for an element to have an average atomic weight that is not a whole number.

Answer 3

The atomic masses of elements are not whole-number values because they are weighted averages of the masses of different isotopes of the element, which have varying numbers of neutrons. Quarks are subatomic particles that make up protons and neutrons, but the fractional atomic masses are primarily due to the combination of isotopic abundance and their nuclear binding energies.

Answer 4

D. Protons