Atom of Ernest Rutherford, bombarded a metal foil with alpha particles to observe how they scattered. They expected all the alpha particles to pass straight through with little deflection, because Thomson's model said that the charges in the atom are so diffuse that their electric fields could not affect the alpha particles much. However, Geiger and Marsden spotted alpha particles being deflected by angles greater than 90°, which was supposed to be impossible according to Thomson's model. To explain this, Rutherford proposed that the positive charge of the atom is concentrated in a tiny nucleus at the center of the atom.
Empire of the Atom Empire of the Atom Empire of the Atom is a science fiction novel by Canadian American writer A. E. van Vogt. It was first published in 1957 by Shasta Publishers in an edition of 2,000 copies. The novel is a fix-up of the first five of van Vogt's Gods stories which originally appeared in the magazine "Astounding". The remaining Gods stories are collected in "The Wizard of Linn". Author and critic James Blish observed that the plot of the Gods stories resembled that of Robert Graves' "Claudius" novels. Author and critic Damon Knight said that the plot was "lifted almost