Salts: atoms, ions, electrons

Atoms and ions are brought to life in "Salts" -- a fully interactive atomistic simulation that reveals the motions of atoms and ions as they interact to form beautiful crystals. Discover the physics behind the structures and properties of these minerals, and explore the effects of charge and ionic radii on melting points, bond strength, and crystal lattices.

Fun for all ages! In this App you can interact with a sophisticated computational chemistry simulation right on your iPad. This 2-D Molecular Dynamics simulation computes the motions of atoms and ions as they attract or repel, and collide with one another. Modeled after the user interactions from "Atoms in Motion": with the tap of a finger you can add, delete, and move atoms, pinch or expand to dynamically change the volume, and with a gentle swipe of your finger the temperature can be scaled between 1 - 1,500K. Now as you build and create experiments, you can easily save, manage, and organize them from within the App.

Learn about Coulomb's law, the states-of-matter, and the behaviors of ionic solids, liquids, and gases! This Molecular Dynamics simulation solves the pairwise Coulombic interactions between ions and includes a strong repulsive shell to define their radius. "Salts" includes the following ions: Na+, Cl-, Ca2+, and S2-; and a neutral gas atom: He. In the simulation you can readily make NaCl (Sodium Chloride) and CaS (Calcium Sulfide) crystals -- both of which have the rock salt structure. Alternatively, you can create more complex salts such as CaCl2 (Calcium Chloride) and Na2S (Sodium Sulfide) to explore the effects of balancing charges within the crystals. Finally, the simulation includes helium (He), which is a neutral noble gas element that interacts through van der Waals forces.

Enjoy the atoms (and the ions)!