A science questionn?

Question

so i know solid molecules vibrate; liquid molecules are close together.

my question is,

in a diagram, does each liquid molecule touch each other or is there a little space between each particle?

sorry for the confusing wording(;

thank you to all who answer.

Answer 1

I'm not sure what you are getting at here. All particles vibrate a bit. And the state of an object (solid liquid or gas) is definded by how far apart the molecules are. In a gas they are (relatively) far apart and in a solid the molecules are (relatively) close together.

Take water.

At 100C it is steam (a gas), the particles are a long way apart so you can see through it. but you can't feel it. They are also vibrating quite fast and therefore give off heat.

At 28C it is water (a liquid), the particles are closer together, you can see through it a bit, and you can feel it. The particles have been pushed together and are vibrating a bit slower (less room to move)

At 0C it is ice (a solid), the particles are really close together and you can't really see through it and it feels hard. The particles have been pushed even closer together and are vibrating even slower (even less room to move).

As an example get 10 rice grains. Let each one of them represent a molecule. Put them in a shoe box - lots of room=gas. Put them in a teaspoon - a bit of room = liquid. Squeeze them between the palms of your hands - no room = solid.

At the atomic level, there is always space between the molecules. There is just more space in a gas and less in a solid

Answer 2

Based on our currently accepted model of the atom, the outermost boundary of each atom is the volume of space occupied by valence electrons. Since each atoms are surrounded by these negatively charged particles, there would be a slight repulsion as they come into close to one another. What is holding these particles on the other hand, are the intermolecular forces of attraction like the London dispersion force, dipole-dipole interaction, hydrogen bonding and electrostatic attraction.

Sorry to go into so much detail about this, but focusing on the valence electrons alone would definitely indicate that there is a gap present even among solids and the degree of this space is greater among liquids compare to solids.