Question

Explain atomic mass unit in detail.

Answer 1

Every particle of matter has some amount of mass associated with it whether small or large. Everything is made up of atoms. Mass of an atomic particle is called the atomic mass. This is commonly expressed as per the international agreement in terms of unified atomic mass unit (amu). It can be best defined as 1/12 the mass of a carbon-12 atom in its ground state. The mass of an atom can be accounted by the sum of the mass of protons and neutrons which is almost equal to the atomic mass. This small change is due to the binding energy mass loss.

$1amu=1.66\times {10}_{-24}g$.

The atomic mass of an atom is a dimensionless number when it is divided by unified atomic mass or Daltons. This is called the relative isotropic mass. The atomic masses of elements vary from 1.008 amu for hydrogen up to 250 amu for elements which have a very high atomic number. Mass of molecules can be determined by adding the average atomic mass of each atom in the molecule.