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The Development of the Atomic Theory

  • 500 BCE

    Democritus

    Democritus
    Democritus was an Ancient Greek pre-Socratic philosopher primarily remembered today for his formulation of an atomic theory of the universe. He thought that all matter was made up of tiny, indivisible particles, or atoms
  • Christiaan Huygens

    Christiaan Huygens
    Christiaan Huygens was a Dutch physicist, mathematician, astronomer and inventor, who is widely regarded as one of the greatest scientists of all time and a major figure in the scientific revolution. He believed that light was made up of waves vibrating up and down perpendicular to the direction of the light travels, and therefore formulated a way of visualising wave propagation.
  • Isaac Newton

    Isaac Newton
    Sir Isaac Newton is best known for his work on gravity, but he worked on and discovered many other scientific wonders during his lifetime. In 1704, Newton theorized a mechanical universe with small, solid masses in motion.
  • John dalton

    John dalton
    Dalton was an English chemist, physicist, and meteorologist. He is best known for introducing the atomic theory into chemistry, and for his research into colour blindness. Dalton said All matter is made of atoms.
  • Gustav Kirchhoff

    Gustav Kirchhoff
    Gustav Robert Kirchhoff was a German physicist who contributed to the fundamental understanding of electrical circuits, spectroscopy, and the emission of black-body radiation by heated objects. He discovered two alkali metals cesium and ribidium.
  • James Maxwell

    James Maxwell
    James was a Scottish scientist in the field of mathematical physics. His most notable achievement was to formulate the classical theory of electromagnetic radiation, bringing together for the first time electricity, magnetism, and light as different manifestations of the same phenomenon. Maxwell demonstrated that electric and magnetic fields travel through space as waves moving at the speed of light.
  • Heinrich Hertz

    Heinrich Hertz
    He was the first one to prove the existence of electromagnetic waves based off of maxwells theory of light. He is most known for the discovery of electromagnetic radiation. which refers to the waves of the electromagnetic feild that carry radiant energy.
  • J.J Thomson

    J.J Thomson
    J.J.Thomson discovered the electron by experimenting with a cathode ray tube.He demonstrated that cathode rays were negatively charged.In addition,he also studied positively charged particles in neon gas.Thomson realized that the accepted model of an atom did not account for negatively or positively charged particles.Therefore,he proposed a model of the atom which he likened to plum pudding.The negative electrons represented the raisins in the pudding and the dough contained the positive charge.
  • Ernest Rutherford

    Ernest Rutherford
    Rutherford studied radiation and used gamma rays to conduct his experaments. He proved that the nucleus of the atom was positive by shooting aplpha particles at a sheet of gold foil and watched which paticles passed through, and which ones deflected
  • Albert Einstein

    Albert Einstein
    Albert created a formula to mathemataclly prove that atoms exist. This commonly heard formula is E=mc^2 and he also wrote a paper on Brownain Motion which helped strengthen the atomic theory.
  • Max Planck

    Max Planck
    He was the originator of the quantum theory. His theory reinvented the way humans understand atoms and subatomic particles.
  • Neils Bhor

    Neils Bhor
    He theorized that the chemical properties and the ientity of the atom depended on the ammount of electrons can leap to and from different orbitals within the atom.