Ernest Rutherford

Ernest Rutherford, 1st Baron Rutherford of Nelson, was a New Zealand physicist who came to be known as the father of Nuclear Physics. According to the Nobel Prize Organization, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1908 for his investigations into the disintegration of elements and the chemistry of radioactive substances. While working at the University of Manchester, he postulated the nuclear structure of the Atom after observing the results of the Gold Foil Experiment. This discovery overturned the Plum Pudding Model proposed by J.J. Thomson. Ernest Rutherford also discovered the Proton and hypothesized the existence of the Neutron during his tenure at the Cavendish Laboratory at the University of Cambridge. His research into Radioactivity led to the classification of Alpha Radiation and Beta Radiation. More information on his life and scientific legacy is available via Britannica.

• Niels Bohr
• James Chadwick
• Atomic Nucleus
• Radioactive Decay