Why is Mercury the only metal which is a liquid at room temp???
P.S: this was where i found the answer when i was asking the same question, so i guess credits go to this author. Okay, to start with let’s just go over what makes a metal a metal. A metal is an element where the nuclei are evenly spaced in a lattice arrangment and the electrons flow around this lattice of positively charged nuceli. Because the electrons are free to move, metals are able to conduct electricity VERY well. Metals are also able to conduct heat very well since the energy associated with heat can easily be passed along all of the electrons flowing around these nuclei. The fact that the nuclei are surrounded in a sea of electrons also means that metals can be beaten and pounded and pulled without breaking as the electrons allow the nuclei to move past each other yet still remain connected. This strong attraction also means that the positively charged nuclei are fully surrounded by negatively charged electrons, so they have no want/need to go anywhere. As a result, most metal
