When Rutherford's coworkers bombarded gold foil with a particles, they obtained results that overturned the existing (Thomson) model of the atom. Explain.

Thomson model compared the structure of the atom with a watermelon in which the red portion signifies the positive charge and the electrons which are negatively charged are embedded in this portion as seeds are embedded in the watermelon.

The structure was not able to explain the stability of the atom and also the Rutherford experiment which is:

Rutherford conducted an experiment in which he took a thin gold particle film on which he passes alpha - particles. He noticed that:

Most of the alpha particles get through the film and can be detected by the detector. Around small portion of the alpha particle deflected at small angles. A very very few alpha particle (approximately 1 out of 1 million alpha particles) just retraced their path which means come back from the center.

He concluded that:

Most of space of atom is empty and in center of atom, there is solid mass which is cause of alpha particles to come back. He gave term nucleus to this solid mass.