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Exercise · Q18

Q.Answer the following question.
Write the drawbacks of Rutherford's model of an atom.

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Step 1. The instability problem. Rutherford's electrons orbit the nucleus like planets around the sun, but an electron moving in a circle is constantly changing direction, i.e. constantly accelerating. By Maxwell's electromagnetic theory, an accelerating charged particle must continuously radiate energy. An electron losing energy this way would spiral steadily inward and crash into the nucleus almost instantly — yet real atoms are observably stable, so this is a fatal flaw. …

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