What shall we learn today?
Five levels, one path
Featured topics
Matter, atoms, molecules, chemical elements
Distinguish pure substances, elements, compounds and mixtures by the particles they contain. Connect atoms to molecules and chemical formulas.
Chemical reactions and how to recognise them
A chemical reaction rearranges atoms into new substances. Observable changes can provide evidence, but a change of state alone is not a reaction.
Oxides, acids, bases, salts
Classify common inorganic compounds and use simple reaction patterns to predict products. Learn how acids and bases react and how indicators reveal pH.
Subatomic particles, isotopes, atomic number, mass number
Use proton, neutron and electron counts to identify atoms and ions. Isotopes share an atomic number but have different mass numbers.
Orbitals, electron configuration, quantum numbers
Where electrons are likely to be found around a nucleus, and how that pattern fills up the periodic table.
Periodic table and periodic trends
Why the periodic table has its shape, and how atomic size, ionization energy and electronegativity change across it.
Recent Nobel laureates See all
Richard Robson
In 1989 combined copper ions with a four-armed molecule to make the first porous crystal of the kind later called a metal–organic framework.
Susumu Kitagawa
Showed that gases can flow in and out of porous coordination polymers and predicted that such frameworks could be made flexible.
Omar Yaghi
Made stable metal–organic frameworks and showed they can be designed rationally, founding reticular chemistry.
David Baker
Pioneered computational protein design and won half of the 2024 chemistry prize; the other half went to Hassabis and Jumper for AlphaFold.
Demis Hassabis
Co-led the development of AlphaFold, the AI system that predicts protein structures, and shared the 2024 chemistry prize.
John Jumper
Co-developed AlphaFold at DeepMind and shared the 2024 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.