Rutherford's gold foil experiment provided evidence for which of the following statements?

• A. Most of the atom's mass and positive charge are concentrated in a small nucleus.
• B. Electrons are uniformly distributed throughout the atom.
• C. Atoms are composed entirely of empty space.
• D. Protons and neutrons are evenly spread throughout the atom.

Answer: (A)

Verified step by step guidance

1. Recall the main goal of Rutherford's gold foil experiment: to investigate the structure of the atom by observing how alpha particles scatter when directed at a thin gold foil.
2. Understand the key observation: most alpha particles passed straight through the foil, but a small fraction were deflected at large angles, and some even bounced back.
3. Interpret these observations: the fact that most particles passed through suggests that atoms are mostly empty space, but the large deflections indicate the presence of a small, dense, positively charged center.
4. Conclude that this dense center is the nucleus, which contains most of the atom's mass and all of its positive charge, disproving the earlier 'plum pudding' model where positive charge was thought to be spread out.
5. Summarize that Rutherford's experiment provided evidence that most of the atom's mass and positive charge are concentrated in a small nucleus, while electrons occupy the surrounding space.