SCIENTISTS WHO

CONTRIBUTED IN THE
DISCOVERY OF ATOM ARE :-

1) JOHN DALTON
 2) JOSEPH JOHN THOMSON

3) ERNEST RUTHERFORD

4) NIELS BOHR

JOHN DALTON

John Dalton (6 September 1766 – 27

July 1844) was an English, chemist,
physicist and meteorologist. He is best
known for his pioneering work in the
development of modern atomic theory,
and his research into colour blindness
(sometimes referred to as Daltonism, in
his honour).
 JOHN DALTON

He proposed the Atomic Theory in 1803

which stated that -
(1) All matter was composed of small
indivisible particles termed atoms
(2) Atoms of a given element possess
unique characteristics and weight
(3) Three types of atoms exist: simple
(elements), compound (simple
molecules), and complex (complex
molecules).

He said that an element is pure is

because all atoms of an element were
identical and that in particular they had
the same mass. He also said that the
reason elements differed from one
another was that atoms of each
element were different from one
another; in particular, they had
different masses. He also said that
compounds consisted of atoms of
different elements combined
together. Compounds are pure
substances because the atoms of
different elements are bonded to one
another somehow, perhaps by hooks, and
are not easily separated from one
another. Compounds have constant
composition because they contain a
fixed ratio of atoms and each atom has
its own characteristic weight, thus fixing
the weight ratio of one element to the
other. In addition he said that chemical
reactions involved the
rearrangement of combinations of
those atoms. Dalton's model was that
the atoms were tiny, indivisible,
indestructible particles and that each
one had a certain mass, size, and
chemical behavior that was determined
by what kind of element they were.

JOSEPH JOHN
THOMSON
Sir Joseph John “J.J.” Thomson, (18
December 1856 – 30 August 1940) was a
British physicist and Nobel laureate,
credited for the discovery of the electron
and of isotopes, and the invention of the
mass spectrometer. He was awarded the
1906 Nobel Prize in Physics for the
discovery of the electron and his work on
the conduction of electricity in gases.

In 1897 the physicist Joseph John (J. J.)

Thomson (1856–1940) discovered the
electron in a series of experiments
designed to study the nature of electric
discharge in a high-vacuum cathode-ray
tube—an area being investigated by
numerous scientists at the time. Thomson
interpreted the deflection of the rays by
electrically charged plates and magnets
as evidence of "bodies much smaller than
atoms" that he calculated as having a
very large value for the charge to mass
ratio.
PLUM PUDDING MODEL BY
J.J. THOMSON

The plum pudding model of the atom

by J.J. Thomson, who discovered the
electron in 1897, was proposed in 1904
before the discovery of the atomic
nucleus. In this model, the atom is
composed of electrons surrounded by a
soup of positive charge to balance the
electron's negative charge, like
negatively-charged "plums" surrounded
by positively-charged "pudding".
ERNEST RUTHERFORD

Ernest Rutherford (30 August 1871 –

19 October 1937) was a New Zealand-
Born British chemist and Physicist who
became known as the father of nuclear
physics. He was responsible for a
remarkable series of discoveries in the
fields of radioactivity and nuclear physics.
He discovered alpha and beta rays, set
forth the laws of radioactive decay, and
identified alpha particles as helium
nuclei. He also discovered that atoms
have a small charged nucleus, and
thereby pioneered the Rutherford model
of the atom, through his discovery of
Rutherford scattering with his gold foil
experiment. He was awarded the Nobel
Prize in Chemistry in 1908. Rutherford
deflected alpha rays with both electric
and magnetic fields in 1903. He also
observed that the intensity of
radioactivity fell off with time, and named
the halving time the "half-life”.

ERNEST RUTHERFORD

THE RUTHERFORD MODEL

The Rutherford model or planetary
model is a model of the atom devised by
Ernest Rutherford. Rutherford directed
the famous Geiger-Marsden experiment in
(1909), which suggested to Rutherford's
 analysis (1911) that the Plum pudding
model (of J. J. Thomson) of the atom was
incorrect. Rutherford's new model for the
atom, based on the experimental results,
had a number of essential modern
features, including a relatively high
central charge concentrated into a very
small volume in comparison to the rest of
the atom and containing the bulk of the
atomic mass (the nucleus of the atom),
and a number of tiny electrons circling
around the nucleus like planets around

the sun.
A representation of the Rutherford model of a lithium atom
 NIELS BOHR

Niels Henrik David Bohr ( 7 October

1885 – 18 November 1962) was a Danish
physicist who made fundamental
contributions to understanding atomic
structure and quantum mechanics, for
which he received the Nobel Prize in
Physics in 1922. Bohr mentored and
collaborated with many of the top
physicists of the century at his institute in
Copenhagen. He was also part of the
team of physicists working on the
Manhattan Project. His son, Aage Niels
Bohr, grew up to be an important
physicist who, like his father, received the
Nobel prize, in 1975. Bohr has been
described as one of the
most influential physicists of the 20th
century.

NIELS BOHR

BOHR’S CONTRIBUTIONS

1) The Bohr model of the atom, the

theory that electrons travel in
discrete orbits around the atom's
nucleus.
2) The shell model of the atom, where
the chemical properties of an
element are determined by the
electrons in the outermost orbit.
3) The correspondence principle, the

basic tool of Old quantum theory.

4) The liquid drop model of the atomic

nucleus.
5) Identified the isotope of uranium

that was responsible for slow-

neutron fission - 235U.
6) Much work on the Copenhagen

interpretation of quantum
mechanics.
7) The principle of complementarity:

that items could be separately

analyzed as having several
contradictory properties.
 NIELS BOHR

THE BOHR MODEL

In atomic physics, the Bohr model

created by Niels Bohr in 1913
depicts the atom as a small,
positively charged nucleus
surrounded by electrons that travel
in circular orbits around the nucleus
—similar in structure to the solar
system, but with electrostatic forces
providing attraction, rather than
gravity. The model's key success lay
in explaining the Rydberg formula
for the spectral emission lines of
atomic hydrogen. While the Rydberg
formula had been known
experimentally, it did not gain a
theoretical underpinning until the
Bohr model was introduced. Not only
did the Bohr model explain the
reason for the structure of the
Rydberg formula, but it provided a
justification for its empirical results
in terms of fundamental physical
constants. The Bohr model is a
primitive model of the hydrogen
atom. As a theory, it can be derived
as a first-order approximation of the
hydrogen atom using the broader
and much more accurate quantum
mechanics, and thus may be
considered to be an obsolete
scientific theory.
A representation of the Bohr model of the hydrogen atom