Geiger and Marsdens

apparatus
AT O M I C ST RUCT URE
Developing the atomic
model
G At end of the 19th century, sci enti sts
thought that the atomwasa posi ti vely
charged blob wi th negati vely charged
electronsscattered throughout i t. At
the suggesti on of Bri ti sh physi ci st
Ernest Rutherford, JohannesGei ger
and Earnest Marsden conducted an
experi ment that changed thi svi ew of
the atomi c model.
G Sci enti stshad recently di scovered that
some elementswere radi oacti ve they
emi tted parti clesfrom thei r nuclei asa
result of nuclear i nstabi li ty. O ne type
of parti cle, alpha radi ati on, i sposi ti vely
charged. Gei ger and Marsden
i nvesti gated how alpha particles
scattered by bombardi ng them agai nst
thi n sheetsof gold, a metal wi th a hi gh
atomic mass.
G They used a tube of radon, a
radi oacti ve element, i n a metal block
( a) asthe source of a narrow beam of
alpha parti clesand placed a sheet of
gold foi l i n the center of thei r
apparatus( b) . After they bombarded
the sheet, they detected the pattern of
alpha parti cle scatteri ng by usi ng a
fluorescent screen ( c) placed at the
focal length of a mi croscope ( d) .
G I f the exi sti ng model had been correct,
all of the parti cleswould have been
found wi thi n a fracti on of a degree of
the beam. But Gei ger and Marsden
found that alpha parti cleswere
scattered at anglesaslarge as140.
G From thi sexperi ment, Rutherford
deduced that the posi ti vely charged
alpha parti cleshad come i nto the
repulsi ve fi eld of a hi ghly concentrated
posi ti ve charge at the center of the
atom. He, therefore, concluded that an
atom hasa small dense nucleusi n
whi ch all of the posi ti ve charge and
most of the massi sconcentrated.
Negati vely charged electronssurround
the nucleus si mi lar to the way the
planetsorbi t the Sun.
alpha particle
atom
atomic mass
Key words
14
d b
a
c
a so u rc e o f a lp h a p a rti c le s
ra d o n tu b e )
b g o ld fo i l
c sc re e n
d m i c ro sc o p e

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