THE QUANTUM BODY

One of the mysteries of science
is how something as apparently
solid and straightforward as
your body can be made of
strangely behaving quantum
particles such as atoms and
their constituents. If you ask
most people to draw a picture
of one of the atoms in their
bodies, they will produce
something like a miniature solar
system, with a nucleus as the
sun and electrons whizzing
round like planets. This was,
indeed, an early model of the
atom, but it was realised that
such atoms would collapse in
an instant. This is because
electrons have an electrical
charge and accelerating a
charged particle, which is
necessary to keep it in orbit,
would make it give off energy in
the form of light, leaving the
electron spiralling into the
nucleus.
In reality, electrons are
confined to specific orbits, as if
they ran on rails. They can’t
exist anywhere between these
orbits but have to make a
“quantum leap” from one to
another. What’s more, as
quantum particles, electrons
exist as a collection of
probabilities rather than at
specific locations, so a better
picture is to show the electrons
as a set of fuzzy shells around
the nucleus.