Rutherford, Ernest model, 40-41 scattering experiments

Sir Ernest Rutherford (1871-1937 Nobel Prize for chemistry 1908, which as a physicist he puzzled over) was a brilliant experimentalist endowed with an equal genius of being able to interpret the results. He recognized three types of radiation (alpha, beta, and gamma). He used scattering experiments with alpha radiation, which consists of helium nuclei, to prove that the atom is almost empty. The diameter of the atomic nucleus is about 10 000 times smaller than the atom itself. Furthermore, he proved that atoms are not indivisible and that in addition to protons, there must also be neutrons present in their nucleus. With Niels Bohr he developed the core-shell model of the atom. 

---