B Is it possible to ionise a solid, so that it has no electrons left?

Josiah
Messages
32
Reaction score
1
TL;DR Summary
I was just wondering about the ionisation of solids.
Hi, is it possible to ionise a solid, so that it has no electrons left?
Josiah
 
Physics news on Phys.org
Josiah said:
TL;DR Summary: I was just wondering about the ionisation of solids.

Hi, is it possible to ionise a solid, so that it has no electrons left?
Josiah
What would hold the atoms (nuclei) together?

Remove too many electrons and the remaining ions will fly apart (for instance by stripping away electrons using laser fields, see e.g., Coulomb explosion).
 
  • Informative
  • Like
Likes AndreasC and hutchphd
Josiah said:
Hi, is it possible to ionise a solid, so that it has no electrons left?
Yes, but only at the surface of insulators. UV light ionises atoms and molecules on the surface of dry plastic polymers. Those particles are then ejected from the solid by the positive nuclear charge because the bonds have been removed. Keeping the surface of a plastic wet transports electrons to ionised sites before the local damage can eject a particle.

No, for conductive materials. Metals will remain intact because they share an internal cloud of free electrons. The positive charged solid attracts or scavenges any stray electrons that may come nearby, then shares them out to where they are needed.
 
DrClaude said:
What would hold the atoms (nuclei) together?
Um, the sound of the kaboom? :smile:
 
From the BCS theory of superconductivity is well known that the superfluid density smoothly decreases with increasing temperature. Annihilated superfluid carriers become normal and lose their momenta on lattice atoms. So if we induce a persistent supercurrent in a ring below Tc and after that slowly increase the temperature, we must observe a decrease in the actual supercurrent, because the density of electron pairs and total supercurrent momentum decrease. However, this supercurrent...
Back
Top