Scientists have been studying the nucleus of the atom ever since Ernest Rutherford first discovered it in 1909. Twenty-five years later, scientists were already describing the nucleus as a ...

I read with great interest the article by Katherine Bourzac “Divining the Mysteries of the Atomic Nucleus” in the Jan. 29, 2024, issue of C&EN (page 30). Curious readers might like to know that an ...

The periodic table is one of the triumphs of science. Even before certain elements had been discovered, this chart could successfully predict their masses, densities, how they would link up with other ...

A part of Rutherford’s scattering experiments, this particular experiment involved shooting alpha particles at a piece of gold foil with the source, foil, and detector placed in a vacuum vessel.