The first electron shell which is the nearest to the nucleus never holds more than 'n' electrons, where 'n' is equal to:

Options

A. 2
B. 8
C. 4
D. 6

Answer

A

Explanation

Each shell can contain only a fixed number of electrons: The first shell can hold up to two electrons, the second shell can hold up to eight (2 + 6) electrons, the third shell can hold up to 18 (2 + 6 + 10) and so on. The general formula is that the nth shell can in principle hold up to `2(n^2 )` electrons.