It would have taken scientists longer to discover protons. A+
Rutherford called the region in the gold foil experiment that deflected alpha particles the "nucleus." He discovered that the positive charge and most of the mass of an atom were concentrated in this small, dense region.
In Rutherford's metal foil experiment, some alpha particles passed straight through the foil, while others were deflected at various angles. A small fraction of the alpha particles even bounced back towards the source. This led Rutherford to conclude that atoms have a small, dense nucleus at their center.
Rutherford observed that some alpha particles fired at a thin sheet of gold foil were deflected back at very large angles, signaling that the positive charge in an atom is concentrated in a very small, dense nucleus. This discovery contradicted the prevailing model of the atom at the time, known as the plum pudding model, and laid the foundation for the modern understanding of atomic structure.
A beam of alpha particles shot through a thin thin thin gold foil will occasionally have a few coming close to the nucleus of a gold atom - and as alpha particles have the same charge as the nucleus there is a repulsive force, which forces the particle from its original course. To keep a graduate student busy (I believe it was Marsden) Rutherford asked him to investigate if there was any particles that got deflect through an angle larger than 90'. (A preposterous notion) An to his great surprise there was.
positive
It would have taken scientists longer to discover protons. A+
Rutherford called the region in the gold foil experiment that deflected alpha particles the "nucleus." He discovered that the positive charge and most of the mass of an atom were concentrated in this small, dense region.
Most of the particles went through the foil, but some were deflected
Rutherford by bombarding gold foil with positively charged particles and noting that some particles were widely deflected.
Ernest Rutherford explained the behavior of positively charged particles being deflected from metal foils as they interacted with the nucleus of the atom in his famous gold foil experiment. This experiment led to the discovery of the atomic nucleus as a small, dense, positively charged center within the atom.
It would have taken scientists longer to discover protons. -- Suppose Rutherford had not seen any alpha particles deflected back from the gold foil. How would this most likely affected scientific understanding of the structure of an atom?
Ernest Rutherford used the technology of radioactivity and conducted the famous gold foil experiment to discover the structure of the atom. By directing alpha particles at a thin gold foil, he observed how they were deflected, which led to the understanding that atoms have a small, positively charged nucleus at their center.
Ernest Rutherford is the scientist who discovered the nucleus through his gold foil experiment in 1909. He observed that most of the alpha particles passed through the foil, but some were deflected, leading him to propose the existence of a dense, positively charged nucleus at the center of an atom.
The purpose of the fluorescent screen in Rutherford's experiment was to detect the alpha particles that were deflected when they struck the gold foil. The screen would light up when hit by the alpha particles, allowing Rutherford to observe and measure the deflection pattern and infer the structure of the atom.
Rutherford conducted an experiment in which Alpha particles were fired at a gold nucleus. Most of the particles passed through unaffected. However, some were deflected by a small amount whilst an even smaller number of the particles were deflected completely. This led to the conclusion that the atom has an extremely small, central, positively charged nucleus. As both the positive alpha particle and the positive nucleus repel each other by electrostatic forces. The fact that only a small amount of particles are deflected shows that the nucleus is only a tiny central part of the atom.
Rutherford detected the particles' paths using a fluorescent screen that emitted light when struck by the particles. By observing the pattern of scattered particles on the screen, he determined that most particles passed through the foil but some were deflected at large angles, leading to the conclusion that atoms have a dense, positively charged nucleus at their center.
The experimental evidence led Rutherford to conclude that an atom is mostly empty space because most of the particles weren't deflected off of the gold foil in his experiment.