Which of Rutherford's (gold foil experiment) claims DID NOT support a previous model?

A

The atom is a dense solid ball of matter

B

The electron is the largest subatomic particle.

C

The atom is made mostly of empty space

D

The nucleus has a neutron.

The answer is C.

Explanation:

In the early 20th century, Thomson's model of the atom was believed to be correct. This model also called a plum-pudding model, presented electrons as particles embedded in a spherical positively charged matter (like plums in a pudding). However, analyzing results of the gold foil experiment, Rutherford in 1911, showed this to be incorrect. He bombarded a thin layer of good foil with a beam of positively charged particles. If the plum-pudding model was true, he expected those particles to pass through the foil, and most of them did. However, some of the particles deflected at very big angles and some of them ever came back. That led him toward conclusion that positive particles deflected because they hit positive part of the gold foil atoms, but since only few particles did so, he presumed that positive part of the atom was very small (thus hard to hit). He also approximated the diameter of this positively charged part (nucleus) and found that it was few thousand times smaller than the previously approximated diameter of the atom, so he proposed that that difference was actually empty space.

So the biggest Rutherford's claim are:

-Atom mostly consists of empty space

- Positive charges are concentrated in a small central part of the atom called the nucleus

- Electrons orbit the nucleus similar to the planets orbiting the Sun (this model is also called the planetary model)