Eli5: what are things like carbon-12? Are they carbons but with a nucleon mass of 12? And how are electrons related?

Question

Eli5: what are things like carbon-12? Are they carbons but with a nucleon mass of 12? And how are electrons related?

In: Chemistry

Answer 1

Isotopes have more or fewer neutrons than other atoms of it’s kind.

Electrons are not being considered when we talk about things like Carbon-12. Having more or fewer electrons causes an atom to be an ion (for example, sodium chloride dissociates into a pair of Na+ and a Cl- ions, one with an extra electron and one with a missing electron)

so back to isotopes; Carbon-12 and Carbon-14 have the same number of protons and electrons, with Carbon-14 having **two extra neutrons**. This makes it heavier but does not change the atomic number (same number of protons) or the electric charge (same number of electrons). Extra neutrons makes the atom heavier and typically less stable.