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After Rutherford's discovery, subsequent research determined the atomic structure which led to Rutherford's gold foil experiment. Scientists eventually discovered that atoms have a positively charged nucleus (with an atomic number of charges) in the center, with a radius of about 1.2 × 10 −15 meters × [atomic mass number] 1 ⁄ 3 .
The prevailing model of atomic structure before Rutherford's experiments was devised by J. J. Thomson. [1]: 123 Thomson had discovered the electron through his work on cathode rays [2] and proposed that they existed within atoms, and an electric current is electrons hopping from one atom to an adjacent one in a series.
Rutherford's model, being supported primarily by scattering data unfamiliar to many scientists, did not catch on until Niels Bohr joined Rutherford's lab and developed a new model for the electrons. [56]: 304 Rutherford model predicted that the scattering of alpha particles would be proportional to the square of the atomic charge.
A schematic of the nucleus of an atom indicating β − radiation, the emission of a fast electron from the nucleus (the accompanying antineutrino is omitted). In the Rutherford model for the nucleus, a red sphere was a proton with positive charge, and a blue sphere was a proton tightly bound to an electron, with no net charge.
Ernest Rutherford, 1st Baron Rutherford of Nelson, (30 August 1871 – 19 October 1937), was a New Zealand physicist who was a pioneering researcher in both atomic and nuclear physics. He has been described as "the father of nuclear physics", [ 7 ] and "the greatest experimentalist since Michael Faraday ". [ 8 ]
This process allowed them to count alpha particles [3] [4] [5] [2] and led Rutherford to start thinking about the structure of the atom. In 1911 Geiger and John Mitchell Nuttall discovered the Geiger–Nuttall law (or rule) and performed experiments that led to Rutherford's atomic model. [6]
In atomic physics, the Bohr model or Rutherford–Bohr model was the first successful model of the atom. Developed from 1911 to 1918 by Niels Bohr and building on Ernest Rutherford 's nuclear model , it supplanted the plum pudding model of J J Thomson only to be replaced by the quantum atomic model in the 1920s.
Thomson's model marks the moment when the development of atomic theory passed from chemists to physicists. While atomic theory was widely accepted by chemists by the end of the 19th century, physicists remained skeptical because the atomic model lacked any properties which concerned their field, such as electric charge, magnetic moment, volume, or absolute mass.