Asked by: SREEJITH
Subject: Naming Of KLMN Shells?
Question: What is the significance of the naming of K,L,M,N..shells?
Why didn't put A,B,C,D..
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A few years ago my sister, who is an accomplished seamstress, was asked to mend a 19th century dress. She was delighted by the many ingenious compromises between economy and extravagance in the dress's design. But the 7" wide tucks of extra fabric she found in the shoulder and side seams puzzled her at first, since in those times material was valuable and never wasted. She realized that the dress was meant to last a lifetime, and the extra cloth was added to allow the dress to grow with its wearer over the years. Apparently, the dress's owner hadn't expanded in accordance with 19th century expectations.
The electron shell designations were started at K rather than A for similar reasons. Like the extra seam allowance on the dress, the letters A-J never had to be used.
The existence of electron shells was first observed experimentally in Charles Barkla's and Henry Moseley's X-ray absorption studies. Barkla labeled them with the letters K, L, M, N, O, P, and Q. The origin of this terminology was alphabetic. A J series was also suspected, though later experiments indicated that the K absorption lines are produced by the innermost electrons. These letters were later found to correspond to the n-values 1, 2, 3, etc. They are used in the spectroscopic Siegbahn notation.
The name for electron shells is derived from the Bohr model, in which groups of electrons were believed to orbit the nucleus at certain distances, so that their orbits formed "shells" around the nucleus.
The physical chemist Gilbert Lewis was responsible for much of the early development of the theory of the participation of valence shell electrons in chemical bonding. Linus Pauling later generalized and extended the theory while applying insights from quantum mechanics.
Shells The electron shells are labelled K, L, M, N, O, P, and Q; or 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7; going from innermost shell outwards. Electrons in outer shells have higher average energy and travel further from the nucleus than those in inner shells. This makes them more important in determining how the atom reacts chemically and behaves as a conductor, because the pull of the atom's nucleus upon them is weaker and more easily broken. In this way, a given element's reactivity is highly dependent upon its electronic configuration. reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electron_shell
It was mentioned in the facts parts of a chemistry book that the alphabet 'K' was used for the first shell because it is the first alphabet in the name of Greek father of gods - 'Kronus'. So the shell names started from 'K' only, leaving space for other hypothetical spectral lines.
the names of orbits or shells in an atom starts with letter K, L, M, N, O etc but not with A, B, C, D etc because K stands for the KORE which means most inner shell. That is why the names start with K and move forward to L, M, N, O, P, and Q. thnk u
A few years ago my sister, who is an accomplished seamstress, was asked to mend a 19th century dress. She was delighted by the many ingenious compromises between economy and extravagance in the dress's design. But the 7" wide tucks of extra fabric she found in the shoulder and side seams puzzled her at first, since in those times material was valuable and never wasted. She realized that the dress was meant to last a lifetime, and the extra cloth was added to allow the dress to grow with its wearer over the years. Apparently, the dress's owner hadn't expanded in accordance with 19th century expectations.
The electron shell designations were started at K rather than A for similar reasons. Like the extra seam allowance on the dress, the letters A-J never had to be used.
Reference: http://antoine.frostburg.edu/chem/senese/101/history/faq/why-KLMNOP.shtml