At the time, scientists believed in the , where an atom was a blob of positive charge with electrons scattered inside like fruit in a pudding. If this were true, the heavy alpha particles should have whizzed straight through the "soft" atoms.
A detector that would flash when hit by an alpha particle. The Unexpected Result Rutherford Gold Foil Experiment - Backstage Science
Chosen because gold is incredibly malleable and can be beaten into a sheet only about 1,000 atoms thick. At the time, scientists believed in the ,
In 1911, Ernest Rutherford and his team (Hans Geiger and Ernest Marsden) conducted the "Gold Foil" experiment, which Backstage Science describes as essentially the . At the time