Who is ernest rutherford

Each element could then be assigned an atomic number and, more important, the properties of each element could be defined by this number. Blackett later proved, with the cloud chamber, that the nitrogen in this process actually could be transformed into an oxygen isotope.

An inspiring leader of the Cavendish Laboratory, he steered numerous future Nobel Prize winners towards their great achievements: Chadwick , Blackett, Cockcroft and Walton ; while other laureates worked with him at the Cavendish for shorter or longer periods: G. Thomson , Appleton , Powell , and Aston. He remained active and working to the very end of his life. Ellis , — a thoroughly documented book which serves as a chronological list of his many papers to learned societies, etc.

Rutherford was knighted in ; he was appointed to the Order of Merit in , and in he was created First Baron Rutherford of Nelson, New Zealand, and Cambridge. He was elected Fellow of the Royal Society in and was its President from to Their only child, Eileen, married the physicist R. He died in Cambridge on October 19, It was later edited and republished in Nobel Lectures.

To cite this document, always state the source as shown above. Back to top Back To Top Takes users back to the top of the page. In , Rutherford took the chair of physics at the University of Manchester. There, he discovered the nuclear nature of atoms and was the world's first successful "alchemist": he converted nitrogen into oxygen. He also became Chairman of the Advisory Council, H. Under Rutherford's directorship, Nobel Prizes were awarded to James Chadwick for discovering the neutron, Cockcroft and Walton for splitting the atom using a particle accelerator and Appleton for demonstrating the existence of the ionosphere.

His research was instrumental in the convening of the Manhattan Project. In , he returned to physics and a long series of experiments in which he discovered that the nuclei of certain light elements, such as nitrogen, could be 'disintegrated' by the impact of energetic alpha particles coming from some radioactive source, and that during this process fast protons were emitted.

This was the first artificially induced nuclear reaction. Rutherford had virtually created a new discipline, that of nuclear physics. In , Rutherford became professor of experimental physics and director of the Cavendish Laboratory at Cambridge, succeeding Thomson. Many of his students at the Cavendish Laboratory went on to become pioneering scientists.

From to he was president of the Royal Society to which he had been elected in In he was awarded a life peerage and died on 19 October He was buried in Westminster Abbey. In , the 'rutherford', a unit of radioactivity, was named in his honour.