Ernest Rutherford (jan 1, 1871 – dec 31, 1937)

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Ernest Rutherford, who had worked under Thomson, performed an experiment, the gold foil experiment, in an attempt to prove the plum pudding model correct. He instead proved it wrong, thus proposing the idea that matter is not as uniform as it appears, and that it contains large regions of empty space and small regions of dense matter. Later, Rutherford developed the nuclear theory of the atom, which states that:
1. Most of the atom's mass and all of its positive charge are contained in the nucleus.
2. Most of the volume of the atom is empty space through which electrons are dispersed.
3. There are as many electrons outside the nucleus as there are protons in the nucleus, so that the atom is neutral.

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