In Ernest Rutherford’s gold foil experiment, the observation that most positively charged particles passed through the foil while a few were strongly deflected led him to infer that an atom’s positive charge must be clustered in a tiny region in its center, called the nucleus. This conclusion was a significant departure from the previously accepted plum pudding model of the atom, which suggested that positive and negative charges were spread throughout the atom. Rutherford's findings laid the groundwork for the modern understanding of atomic structure.
In Ernest Rutherford’s gold foil experiment, most positively charged particles passed through the foil, but a few particles were deflected strongly. What did this result cause Rutherford to infer?
That electrons move in specific orbits around the nucleus of an atom.
That an atom’s positive charge must be clustered in a tiny region in its center, called the nucleus.
That electrons have almost no mass.
That an atom consists of negative charges scattered throughout a ball of positive charge—something like raisins or berries in a muffin.
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