Rutherford's Result

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The point of this experiment was to justify the theory that atoms were permeable neutral balls. They expected that the high-energy charged alpha particles would have no problem zipping through a few atoms. The alpha particles should have just shot straight through the gold foil and left a small region at the back of the screen covered with dots.


In fact, the screen showed dots mostly at the back of the screen; however, much to everyone's surprise, a few dots were scattered near the front of the screen.

What could this mean?


The above images aren't graphics of Rutherford's real experimental data; they are graphical exaggerations of his method and results.