Hydrogen atom Hydrogen atom A hydrogen atom is an atom of the chemical element hydrogen. The electrically neutral atom contains a single positively charged proton and a single negatively charged electron bound to the nucleus by the Coulomb force. Atomic hydrogen constitutes about 75% of the baryonic mass of the universe. In everyday life on Earth, isolated hydrogen atoms (called "atomic hydrogen") are extremely rare. Instead, hydrogen tends to combine with other atoms in compounds, or with itself to form ordinary (diatomic) hydrogen gas, H. "Atomic hydrogen" and "hydrogen atom" in ordinary English use have overlapping, yet distinct, meanings. For example, a
Hot atom Hot atom In physical chemistry, a hot atom is an atom that has a high kinetic or internal energy. When molecule AB adsorbs on a surface dissociatively, In case 2, B gains a high translational energy from the adsorption energy of A, and hot atom B is generated. For example, the hydrogen molecule, because of its light mass, gets a high translational energy. Such a hot atom does not fly into vacuum but is trapped on the surface, where it diffuses with high energy. Hot atoms are expected to play important roles in catalytic reactions. For example, a reaction of