Chosen because gold is incredibly malleable and can be beaten into a sheet only about 1,000 atoms thick.
While most did pass through, Rutherford was shocked to find that: Rutherford Gold Foil Experiment - Backstage Science
A detector that would flash when hit by an alpha particle. The Unexpected Result Chosen because gold is incredibly malleable and can
Videos about some of Britain's most amazing science facilities In 1911, Ernest Rutherford and his team (Hans
Positively charged particles emitted from a radioactive source (radium).
In 1911, Ernest Rutherford and his team (Hans Geiger and Ernest Marsden) conducted the "Gold Foil" experiment, which Backstage Science describes as essentially the .
At the time, scientists believed in the , where an atom was a blob of positive charge with electrons scattered inside like fruit in a pudding. If this were true, the heavy alpha particles should have whizzed straight through the "soft" atoms.