Rutherford Experiment

Experiment Procedure and Result

In 1909, two researchers in Ernest Rutherford's laboratory at the University of
Manchester, Hans Geiger and Ernest Marsden, fired a beam of alpha particles
at a thin metal foil. Alpha particles are one of the types of radiation given off
by radioactive elements such as uranium.

Ernest Rutherford

Hans Geiger

Ernest Marsden

If Thomson's Plum Pudding model was to be accurate, the big alpha particles
should have passed through the gold foil with only a few minor deflections. As
the alpha particles are heavy and the charge in the "plum pudding model" is
widely spread.

However, the actual results surprised Rutherford. Although many of the alpha
particles did pass through as expected, many others were deflected at large
angles while others were reflected back to the alpha source.

Expected results: Alpha particles passing

through the plum pudding model of the
atom are undisturbed.

Observed results: A small portion of the

particles were deflected, indicating a small,
concentrated positive charge.
*The image is not to scale; in reality the
nucleus is vastly smaller than the electron
shell.*

In detail:
A beam of alpha particles, generated by the radioactive decay of radon
was directed normally onto a sheet of very thin gold foil.
A zinc sulphide screen at the focus of a microscope was used as a
detector; the screen and microscope could be swiveled around the foil
to observe particles deflected at any given angle.
Under the prevailing plum pudding model, the alpha particles should
all have been deflected by, at most, a few degrees; measuring the
pattern of scattered particles was expected to provide information
about the distribution of charge within the atom.
However they observed that a very small percentage of particles were
deflected through angles much larger than 90 degrees.

Rutherford made 3 observations:

Most of the fast, highly charged alpha particles went whizzing straight
through undeflected. This was the expected result for all of the particles
if the plum pudding model was correct.
Some of the alpha particles were deflected back through large angles.
This was not expected.

 A very small number of alpha particles were deflected backwards! This

was definitely not as expected.

Theory
Major portion of the atom is empty.
The whole mass of the atom is concentrated in the center of atom
called nucleus.
The positively charged particles are present in the nucleus of atom.
The charge on the nucleus of an atom is equal to (+z.e) where Z=
charge number, e = charge of proton.
The electrons rotate around the nucleus in different circular orbits.
Size of nucleus is very small as compare to the size of atom.
Conclusion
1) Many of the alpha particles were deflected or reflected meant that the
atom had a concentrated center of positive charge and of relatively
large mass.
2) The alpha particles had either hit the positive center directly or passed
by it close enough to be affected by its positive charge.
3) Rutherford was forced to conclude that most of the remainder of the
atom was a region of very low density, because the majority of the
positive particles continued on their original path unmoved.
4) A great deal of charge was also associated with the central region of
high density, which is the nucleus.
5) In 1911, Rutherford rejected J.J. Thomson's plum pudding model of
the atom. He suggested that a large amount of the atom's charge and
mass is concentrated in a very small region, giving it a very high
electric field. Outside of the nucleus, he proposed that the atom was
mostly empty space.
6) Although Rutherford's model of the atom itself had a number of
problems with electron charge placement and motion, the central
conclusion from the GeigerMarsden experiment, the existence of the
nucleus still holds.
7) Rutherford's model was later refined by physicist Neils Bohr in 1913.
Bohr's model of the atom is the basic atomic model used today.