how do we caculate average atomic mass?

Average atomic mass is the weighted average of the atomic masses of the naturally occurring isotopes of an element.

 

To find the average atomic mass of an atom, we take into account all of the isotopes that exist and the percentage of each type.

 

Average atomic mass = (Mass of isotope × Relative abundance)

 

Example:

To calculate average atomic mass of copper, we write the information about copper’s isotopes into the formula and solve it.

 

Average atomic mass of copper = (62.93 amu × 0.6909) + (64.94 amu × 0.3091) = 63.55

 

From the calculation, we can get an average atomic mass of copper i.e, 63.55 amu.

 

You can calculate the atomic mass (average) of chlorine using the following data:

 

	% Natural Abundance	Molar Mass
35Cl	75.77	34.9689
37Cl	24.23	36.9659

The average atomic mass of chlorine

 

 

 

= 26.4959 + 8.9568

 

= 35.4527 u