What is the atomic number of silicon?

What is the atomic number of silicon? 14. Silicon has atomic number 14 because each silicon atom contains 14 protons in its nucleus.

Atomic number is the defining number of an element: changing the proton count changes the element itself. A neutral silicon atom also has 14 electrons, arranged across its electron shells. Its chemical symbol is Si, and it belongs to group 14, alongside carbon, germanium, tin, lead and flerovium.

Silicon is commonly described as a metalloid because it has a mixture of metallic and nonmetallic characteristics. It is a hard, brittle, blue-gray crystalline solid and a semiconductor, meaning its electrical conductivity can be controlled. That property made it central to transistors, integrated circuits, computer processors and many solar cells.

The name comes from Latin silex or silicis, meaning flint. Although silica-rich minerals were known for centuries, isolating the element was difficult because silicon bonds strongly with oxygen. Jöns Jakob Berzelius prepared and characterized relatively pure silicon in 1824.