{"id":232556,"date":"2025-06-12T03:19:59","date_gmt":"2025-06-12T03:19:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/learnexams.com\/blog\/?p=232556"},"modified":"2025-06-12T03:20:02","modified_gmt":"2025-06-12T03:20:02","slug":"what-is-the-atomic-symbol-of-an-isotope-of-iridium-with-120-neutrons","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/2025\/06\/12\/what-is-the-atomic-symbol-of-an-isotope-of-iridium-with-120-neutrons\/","title":{"rendered":"What is the atomic symbol of an isotope of iridium with 120 neutrons"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>What is the atomic symbol of an isotope of iridium with 120 neutrons? Express your answer as an isotope.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong><mark style=\"background-color:rgba(0, 0, 0, 0)\" class=\"has-inline-color has-ast-global-color-1-color\">The Correct Answer and Explanation is:<\/mark><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Correct Answer: 77207Ir\\mathbf{^{207}_{77}Ir}77207\u200bIr<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Explanation:<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>To determine the atomic symbol of an isotope of <strong>iridium (Ir)<\/strong> with <strong>120 neutrons<\/strong>, we need to understand the structure of an isotope and apply the relationship between <strong>protons<\/strong>, <strong>neutrons<\/strong>, and <strong>mass number<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Step 1: Understand the format of an isotope symbol<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>An isotope is typically written in the format:ZAX^{A}_{Z}XZA\u200bX<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Where:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>XXX is the <strong>chemical symbol<\/strong> of the element.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>ZZZ is the <strong>atomic number<\/strong>, which tells us the number of <strong>protons<\/strong>.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>AAA is the <strong>mass number<\/strong>, which is the total number of <strong>protons and neutrons<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Step 2: Determine the atomic number of iridium<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>From the periodic table, we find that <strong>iridium (Ir)<\/strong> has an atomic number of <strong>77<\/strong>. This means that every atom of iridium contains <strong>77 protons<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Step 3: Use the given number of neutrons to find the mass number<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>We are told that this isotope of iridium has <strong>120 neutrons<\/strong>. The <strong>mass number<\/strong> AAA is the sum of the number of protons and neutrons:A=Z+neutrons=77+120=197A = Z + \\text{neutrons} = 77 + 120 = 197A=Z+neutrons=77+120=197<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Oops! Wait \u2014 actually, the <strong>sum should be<\/strong>:A=77+120=197A = 77 + 120 = \\mathbf{197}A=77+120=197<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>BUT that contradicts our earlier answer. Let\u2019s double-check the math carefully.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Actually:77+120=19777 + 120 = \\boxed{197}77+120=197\u200b<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So the <strong>correct mass number<\/strong> is <strong>197<\/strong>, <strong>not 207<\/strong>. That means the correct isotope symbol should be:77197Ir\\boxed{^{197}_{77}Ir}77197\u200bIr\u200b<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Let\u2019s correct it now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">\u2705 Final Answer: 77197Ir\\boxed{^{197}_{77}Ir}77197\u200bIr\u200b<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Detailed Explanation (continued):<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>This isotope of iridium is not one of the most common naturally occurring forms (which are 191Ir^{191}Ir191Ir and 193Ir^{193}Ir193Ir), but isotopes can have a range of neutron counts. Adding more neutrons increases the mass number but doesn\u2019t change the chemical identity, since the number of protons stays the same.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This symbol, 77197Ir^{197}_{77}Ir77197\u200bIr, tells us:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The element is iridium (Ir).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>It has <strong>77 protons<\/strong>.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>It has <strong>120 neutrons<\/strong> (197 &#8211; 77 = 120).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>The total mass number is <strong>197<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>In summary, any isotope of an element is defined by the same number of protons but a different number of neutrons. Here, iridium\u2019s identity is unchanged, but the isotope differs in neutron count, affecting its nuclear properties and stability.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/learnexams-banner9-315.jpeg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-232557\"\/><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What is the atomic symbol of an isotope of iridium with 120 neutrons? Express your answer as an isotope. The Correct Answer and Explanation is: Correct Answer: 77207Ir\\mathbf{^{207}_{77}Ir}77207\u200bIr Explanation: To determine the atomic symbol of an isotope of iridium (Ir) with 120 neutrons, we need to understand the structure of an isotope and apply the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-232556","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-exams-certification"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/232556","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=232556"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/232556\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=232556"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=232556"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learnexams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=232556"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}