And how do scientists measure the average amount of molecular mass for each atom, they cant check every atom of the particular element in the universe to determine its molecular mass , and if scientists take samples from areas rich in a particular type of isotopes, wouldnt it affect the total average molecular mass of an element.
In: Chemistry
Would it not be more odd if every atom created of a given element had the same amount of neutrons?
>they cant check every atom of the particular element in the universe
You can draw conclusions of a population without polling every member of that population. They’re just the average atomic mass you’d expect to find in a generic sample. There can definitely be reasons that a sample would *not* follow the average as well. When processing uranium from Oklo, it was found that there was less U-235 than you would normally expect. It turns out nearly two billion years ago, the conditions were just right (concentration of uranium, water as a neutron moderator) that the uranium deposit went critical and was a naturally occurring fission reactor.
On average, however, samples are average, and have a predictable distribution of isotopes.
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