Rutherford’s Nuclear

Model of the Atom

(1907-1919)(1919)
- In 1907, it is when Rutherford arrived in Manchester.
- He had been named Langworthy Professor of Physics,
successor to Arthur Schuster.
- Schuster had built a modern physics building, hired Hans
Geiger, Ph.D. because of his experimental skill, and endowed
a new position in mathematical physics to round out a full
physics program. Rutherford entered the center of the
physics world. Researchers came to him by the dozen.
- Rutherford arrived with many research questions in mind. He
was not done with the puzzles of the decay families of
thorium, radium, but he was passing much of this work to
Boltwood, Hahn, and Soddy.
- in 1909–1910 and Hahn in 1907–1908, Boltwood and Hahn
both worked with Rutherford in Manchester, Boltwood.
- Rutherford was gradually turning his attention much more to
the α (alpha), β (beta), and γ (gamma) rays themselves and to
what they might reveal about the atom. That is, he was
leaving radio-chemistry to others and turning to physics.
- Geiger and Rutherford published several articles in 1908 and
1909 on these methods and their use.
- In 1910 the autumn he brought Marsden back to Manchester
to complete rigorous experimental testing of his ideas with
Geiger.
- In 1910–1911, Rutherford worked out the basic idea of an
atom with a "charged center."
- in 1917, Rutherford and his lab steward, William Kay, began
to explore the passage of α particles through hydrogen,
nitrogen, and other gases.
- in 1919, Rutherford reported the tentative results of these
extensive experiments.
- Rutherford placed a source of radium C (bismuth-214) in a
sealable brass container, fitted so that the position of the
source could be changed and so that different gases could be
introduced or a vacuum produced, as desired. The α particles
traversed the interior of the container and passed through a
slit, covered by a silver plate or other material, and hit a zinc
sulfide screen, where a scintillation was observed in a
darkened room. When hydrogen gas was introduced into the
container and care was taken to absorb the α particles before
they hit the screen, scintillations were still observed.
Rutherford posited that as the α particles traversed the
hydrogen gas, they occasionally collided with hydrogen
nuclei. As Rutherford wrote, this produced “swift hydrogen
atoms” which were mostly projected forward in the direction
of the α particles’ original motion.

(1907) (1909-1910)
(1910-1911) (1917)
- It is when Rutherford arrived in
Manchester.
- Boltwood and Hahn both worked
with Rutherford in Manchester,
Boltwood.
- The autumn he brought Marsden
back to Manchester to complete
rigorous experimental testing of
his ideas with Geiger.
- Rutherford worked out the basic
idea of an atom with a "charged
center."
- Rutherford and his lab steward,
William Kay, began to explore the
passage of α particles through
hydrogen, nitrogen, and other
gases.
- Rutherford reported the tentative
results of these extensive
experiments.