i read about atoms and said they never touch each other

Question

I read somewhere that atoms never touch ( in a joke ) but how is this possible that we made of atoms and not touch ? But we touch each other and feel ?

In: Biology

Answer 1

Atoms interact with each other through a few different fundamental physical forces. For the interaction that we usually think of as “touch”, the force involved is the electromagnetic force.

Atoms are surrounded by an electromagnetic force field. When the fields of two atoms are close enough to each other to interact they’re touching. The EM field is strong enough that the fields begin to interact at a larger distance than direct surface-to-surface contact of the atomic nuclei.