Rutherford's nuclear bombardment chamber, replica of Cavendish Lab apparatus
date: label: Date made
content: ca. 1960
name: label: originator
content: Rutherford, Ernest
label: manufacturer
content: University of Cambridge. Department of Physics. Cavendish Laboratory
notes: label: Description
content: Rutherford's nuclear bombardment chamber, replica of Cavendish Lab apparatus. Object ID EM.N-08018.
label: Description
content: Brass cylinder with wood base and glass tubing (see 2nd object from right in accompanying image).
label: Description
content: History and basic principle
label: Description
content: In 1898 Ernest Rutherford, a young New Zealander studying with J. J. Thomson at Cambridge University, took up the question of the nature of the radiations emitted by radioactive substances, and for the next thirty years was the leader in this field and in the field of nuclear physics which emerged from it.
label: Description
content: In his investigations at Cambridge, Rutherford distinguished the positively charged alpha rays and the negatively charged beta rays. He subsequently developed the theory of radioactive decay and transformation to account for the process and consequences of emission of such radiations, and the nuclear model of the atom to account for the scattering of such radiations.
label: Description
content: Using alpha-particles from radium as projectiles, between 1916 and 1919 Rutherford studied the effects of bombardment of light atoms: first hydrogen, then oxygen and nitrogen. In April 1919 he found an anomaly which he convincingly explained as due to the disintegration of nitrogen nuclei. It was the first time a nuclear transformation had been produced artificially, and it initiated an active, experimental nuclear physics program. Object EM.N-08018 is a replica of an apparatus Rutherford built in 1921 to continue his investigations of these phenomena at the Cavendish Laboratory, Cambridge University, where he had succeeded J. J. Thomson as director.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: place made
content: United Kingdom: England, Cambridge
label: Associated Place
content: United Kingdom: England, Cambridge
topic: label: general subject association
content: Science & Scientific Instruments
label: general subject association
content: Modern Physics
setName: label: See more items in
content: Medicine and Science: Modern Physics
label: See more items in
content: Science & Mathematics
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Cavendish Laboratory
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: EM.N-08018
label: catalog number
content: N-08018
label: accession number
content: 224580
objectType: label: Object Name
content: Bombardment Chamber
label: Object Name
content: nuclear bombardment chamber (replica)
physicalDescription: label: Measurements
content: cylinder with base: 6 cm x 18 cm x 15 cm; 2 3/8 in x 7 3/32 in x 5 29/32 in
label: Measurements
content: tubing: 22 cm x 14.8 cm x 8 cm; 8 11/16 in x 5 13/16 in x 3 1/8 in