Question

What are the conclusions of the Gold foil Experiment?

Answer 1

Gold-foil experiment:

• Gold-foil experiment was given by Rutherford.
• In his experiment, the $\mathrm{\alpha }-$particles were made to come down on a thin gold foil.
• Many of the $\mathrm{\alpha }-$particles passed linearly through the gold foil.
• Some of the particles deviated at small angles.
• One out of every $12000$ particles appeared to bounce.

Conclusion of Rutherford's model of an atom:

• The space inside an atom is almost empty as most of the $\mathrm{\alpha }-$particles passed without deflection through the gold foil.
• The positive charge occupies a minimum space which indicates that very few particles were diverted from their path.
• A very small proportion of $\mathrm{\alpha }-$particles were diverted by ${180}^{\mathrm{o}}$, indicating that all the positive charge and mass of the gold atom were concentrated in a very small volume within the atom.