Ruther Ford Gold Foil Experiment

The experiment

Rutherford's Gold Foil experiment helped lead to the discovery of the nucleus. What Ruther ford did to discover the nucleus was he used a machine that would shoot some particles that were very small and they have a positive charge. Then what the machine would help do is sprayed the alpha particles on a lead sheet that had a hole. The hole allowed the thin beam of particles to be aimed and shot at a piece of gold foil. What he did to see or saw is that alpha particles would go through the gold foil was that the gold foil was placed in some zine sulfide. The zinc sulfide would be surrounding the gold foil and would flash green when the particles would touch or encounter it.

There were a couple particles that wouldn't go through and those went off at a certain angle. With all of that there were a couple of the particles that would bounce back. What this illustrating is that the majority of particles bounced back because they went head on with something that has a positive charge as well. Which also led Ruther ford to another conclusion which was that the atom was pretty much empty. That was why the particles were going through the atom except when they hit something positive. Then that's when Ruther ford decided that the fact of the particles was bouncing which was making think a lot that is when he could figure out as to why they were bouncing back when they were shot at the led sheet going through the hole and going through the gold sheet hitting the zinc sulfide. He came with a named whatever had the same charge as the alpha particles. Ruther ford named the positive charged thing in the inside of the atom a nucleus. The nucleus was positive charged as already mentioned and stated in the sentences above.

Not only is the nucleus positive charged but is also very very tiny or small compared to the atom its self. Another thing that people should know is that the experiment was done during the year of 1908 through 1913. Something that would be found very interesting is that Ruther ford could win an award just by doing or also known as conducting this experiment. The award that he received was the Nobel price. That is what the gold foil experiment was about.


 By Jaime Cruz


Article Source: Ruther Ford Gold Foil Experiment