# If the nucleons in an atom were heavier, could it still be stable? [closed]

If the protons and neutrons had, say, a hundred times more mass than they normally do, could the atom overall still be stable? Would it affect the atom's electron cloud somehow, or would it still be able to retain its chemical properties?

Additionally; if the nucleons gained this extra mass by being Kaluza-Klein states of protons and neutrons (meaning their constituents would still be the same kind and configuration of quarks, but only differ in mass due to their momentum in extra-dimensions), and not via interaction with the Higgs field, would it alter the way more massive nucleons would affect an atom?

This is meant to be an element alongside our known physical laws, so I'm not wondering how the universe would look like if this were the case since the Big Bang.

In short; What would happen if protons and neutrons were a hundred times heavier, but everything else kept its normal mass?

• Since you're not interested in how such a fictional universe would look or function, I think your query might fit better over on the Physics Stack. Here in Worldbuilding, we'd be much more interested in the ramifications of such a set-up. – elemtilas Jul 13 '19 at 11:09
• Welcome to Worldbuilding, Yaro, your question is more hypothetical physics than anything else. I'd be asking myself would the strong nuclear force be able to hold one hundredfold more massive protons & neutrons together? My guess is no, but I'd love to be proven wrong.. – a4android Jul 13 '19 at 12:17
• @a4android - Would the mass affect the equilibrium distance between charged particles if the gravitational force is negligible compared to other forces? I don't know how this stuff works in quantum field theory but if you think of a classical example like a charged ball that's pulled in one direction by an opposite charge, and pulled back in the other direction because it's attached to a spring fixed to a wall, if the gravitational force is negligible the ball's own mass wouldn't seem to make a difference in terms of how far the spring would be stretched at equilibrium. – Hypnosifl Jul 13 '19 at 14:27
• I suspect this sort of "what if reality was different" question would be closed on Physics SE as being either a personal theory or non-mainstream (covered by same rule). – StephenG Jul 13 '19 at 15:05
• This definitely should not be on Physics; it would be closed. I'd ask people not to vote to migrate it there. – HDE 226868 Jul 13 '19 at 16:29

In particular, decreasing a proton's charge radius increases the proton's potential near the proton's origin by a factor of 100. Fortunately, the volume of this space scales with $$r^3$$ and the potential scales with $$r$$ so the total energies involved are ignorably small instead of scaling to infinity like you would expect from decreasing $$r$$ in the equation $$V=\frac1{4\pi\epsilon_0}\frac qr$$. This potential change affects little things like the electrostatic component of the Gibbs free energy of solvation of an ion. Chemistry still works the way we're used to. The slight differences in chemistry are unnoticeable next to the big differences in classical physics that come from everything being a hundred times denser.