Atom History Essay

In this experiment, you will have a chance to test the hypothesis that Ernest Rutherford used when determining the size of the nucleus. In his "gold foil experiment," Rutherford shot alpha particles at gold atoms. Once he realized that the alpha particles were hitting a concentrated positive mass, he developed the nuclear model of the atom. Next, he set out to determine the relative size of the nucleus compared to the rest of the atom. He reasoned that the smaller the nucleus, the less likely it was to be hit by an alpha particle. This led to a simple comparative ratio:

One of J.J. Thomson's most significant contributions to science, and thus to the study of atomic theory, was his discovery of the electron. Before the discovery of the electron, the atom was already associated with having electric charges-both positive and negative-but the idea of an electron existing as its own particle was unheard of. It was in 1897 when Thomson first conducted the beginning of his now famous experiment, in which he used a cathode ray tube to aid in his findings. A cathode ray tube, is a vacuum tube in which cathode rays, negatively charged particles, are produced at the cathode and travel through the vacuum, which is created when gas is extracted from the tube. J.J. Thomson discovered that in order to determine

the old view of atoms as the basic building blocks of the material world and Newtonian physics

According to DePra’s poem, “The electron is minus, the proton is plus,/ the neutron is neither” (Doc. 2). In other words, a neutron is neutral, the electron is negative and the proton is positive. After these discoveries, more inventions were made to help further our understanding of atoms, for instance, the the electron microscope. Electrons were discovered before Rutherford by JJ Thomas (OI). Thomas was using a cathode ray and discovered that atoms are made of smaller subatomic particles

What is an atom? An atom is the basic building block of everything. An atom is made of electrons protons and neutrons and the number of protons determines the element. Back in the 1800’s this whole idea was unknown. In the 1800’s steam was starting to power everything. It became important to know how steam works, so you can learn to use it more effectively. It was this idea that drove Dalton to research the atom.

Around 2,500 years ago, Democritus and his partner Leucippus were the first ones to develop the atomic theory in written history. Their theory proposed that every kind of matter was made up of tiny particles, which were named atomos, which means that it is indivisible. This meant that Democritus and Leucippus thought there were little particles of everything, but, the next breakthrough in atomic theory wasn’t made until the early 1800s with a french chemist by the name of Antoine Lavoisier, he was the one who came up with the idea of the law of the conservation of mass, which states that matter stays the same even when it changes shape or form. Then, James Dalton said that all matter was made up of atoms, which were indivisible, and unbreakable.

What is the atomic structure you may ask? Well, it’s the law stating the structure of an atom. It is composed of a positively charged nucleus containing a certain amount of protons (positive), neutrons (neutral charge), and electrons (negative). The amount of each subatomic particle (proton, neutron, and electron) all depend on what the element is. Now although this statement may seem fairly simple it was most definitely not. People have been studying the atomic structure for more than 300+ years and are still studying it. So after reading this you may wonder who even made this atomic structure up. After hundreds of years of research there is not any one individual who made the structure up but roughly

Rutherford’s understanding of the atom was that the protons were clustered together in the nucleus. The nucleus is then surrounded by empty space occupied by electrons. (Lucas & Wright, 2001)

Around 1803 John Dalton, an English chemist developed the first useful atomic theory of matter. Amedeo Avogadro, the Italian chemist in 1811 published an article drawing the distinction between the atom and the molecule, which now is known as “Avogadro’s

Over the course of the last 5000 years, mankind’s knowledge has been constantly advancing. Chemistry, a branch of science, has experienced a tremendous leap and expansions since ancient Greek civilization. One of the major breakthroughs in the advancement in Chemistry was the creation of the Atomic theory, which laid a foundation for the modern-day Chemistry and future of science. The Atomic theory introduced the idea of atoms, which are defined as the discrete units of matter. There are five key scientists that significantly contributed to the Atomic model over a span of thousands of years. They are: Democritus, John Dalton, J.J. Thompson, Ernest Rutherford, and Niels Bohr.

Thompson, is another trailblazing intellect. In the South Island of New Zealand, Rutherford was born into a rural community in 1841, as the fourth child out of a grand total of twelve children (Ernest Rutherford's Life, n.d., para. 1). After graduating from a local school in his community and having honors in all of his subjects, he would go to the Canterbury College in Christchurch, New Zealand (Ernest Rutherford's Life, n.d., para.1). In 1892, he would receive a Bachelor’s Degree and Master’s Degree in mathematics, while also receiving a Bachelor’s degree in physical science. Subsequently, he spent time researching for years after (Ernest Rutherford's Life, n.d., para. 2). Rutherford then applied for a scholarship, but sadly lost. However, due to the fact that the original winner was unable to use the scholarship, it was granted to Rutherford, taking him to the Cavendish Laboratory in Cambridge (Ernest Rutherford's Life, n.d., para.3). Here, he met J.J. Thomson, and would pursue to continue his previous work with magnetism; however, Thomson would get Rutherford to do research with him on the induction of ionization, specifically with Roentgen rays (Ernest Rutherford's Life, n.d., para. 3). As time went on, Rutherford would begin to study radioactivity through ionization. Through this, he would discover Becquerel rays and their heterogeneous nature (para 4)1. Particularly, he was able to differentiate

“By 1687, he had theorized that gravity was a force that could hold objects, such as the moon, in orbit around the Earth, and he worked out equations to prove it” (Challenging Limits). He then calculated the laws of motion that held the planets in their orbits around the sun. Along with his research, he invented calculus, the method for working out the speed of an object at any given moment during its path. By the 20th century, scientist could demonstrate atoms and the tiny charged particles they contained called electrons. The electrons are virtually invisible, but Leeuwenhoek used them from an electron microscope that magnified ten million times. Allowing future scientist to develop the MRI scanner, a precise diagnostic tool used to learn about the work of the brain. In addition to the discovery of atoms and their electrons, a physicist by the name of Albert Einstein formulated the theorem E=mc2. Stating that energy resided in matter itself. With this, scientist learned that atoms are our greatest repository of energy. Scientist began to ask if they themselves, “if we could split atoms, could we release the new, limitless supply of energy” (Challenging Limits)? Soon, scientist did split atoms that released massive surges of energy, but also produced lethal radioactivity. This groundbreaking discovery provided a possible solution to what created the

Bohr is well known for his amazing research on the structure of the atom, he thought that maybe the hydrogen atom was based on the quantum theory that energy can only be transferred in one way, and he also thought that E. rutherford model had some problems, so he fixed

Before Rutherford’s Geiger-Marsden experiment the most popular model of the atom was the “plum pudding model” developed in 1904 by the person who also discovered the electron in 1897, J.J. Thompson. It was the most common model of the atom and stated that electrons (plum) floated around with

An Atom is the the basic building block of all matter. Atoms are made up of Particles, called: Protons, neutrons and Electrons. Protons carry a positive charge, the neutron carry 's a neutral charge and the electron carry’s a negative charge. The Atom has two main parts the Nucleus and the Electron Shell. The Nucleus contains the Protons and Neutrons. The electron Shell Contains the The electrons.