What conclusion did Rutherford draw about the position and characteristics. Class 9

What conclusion did Rutherford draw about the position and characteristics. Class 9

Question 1.

What conclusion did Rutherford draw about the position and characteristics of the atom’s positively charged part based on the few alpha particles that bounced back or were deflected at large angles in the gold foil experiment? Class 9

Answer:

Based on the observation that a few alpha particles bounced back or were deflected at large angles, Rutherford drew the following conclusions about the positively charged part of the atom:

1. The positive charge of the atom is not spread throughout the volume of the atom (as Thomson suggested) but is concentrated in an extremely small region at the centre.
2. This small, central, positively charged region is called the nucleus.
3. The nucleus is extremely dense - it contains most of the mass of the atom packed into a very tiny volume.
4. The nucleus is very small compared to the overall size of the atom. The diameter of the atom is approximately 10^-10- m, while the diameter of the nucleus is approximately 10^- 15 m - the nucleus is about 10^5 (one lakh) times smaller than the atom.
5. Since most of the alpha particles passed straight through without deflection, most of an atom is empty space.
6. Only when an alpha particle came very close to the nucleus was it repelled strongly enough to bounce back or deflect at a large angle.