Gold is rarely found in pure form. It is often found in a natural alloy with silver called electrum. It has to be processed to remove the gold. Gold is usually found near other minerals such as quartz, calcite, lead, tellurium, zinc, or copper and is often mined as a by-product of them. To find out what makes gold gold, we must explore the smallest particles of matter, atoms.
Atoms are one of the basic units of matter.
They are about one nanometer across. A nanometer is one-billionth of a meter. This is so small that it cannot be seen. The number of protons in the nucleus defines what type of element the atom will make. Gold atoms contain 79 protons.