X-Nico

3 unusual facts about Antonius van den Broek


Antonius van den Broek

It was not until the work of Henry Moseley working with the Bohr model of the atom with the explicit idea of testing van den Broek's theory, that it was realized that atomic number was indeed a purely physical property (the charge of the nucleus) which could be measured, and that van den Broek's original guess had been correct, or very close to correct.

This hypothesis was published in 1911 and inspired the experimental work of Henry Moseley, who found good experimental evidence for it by 1913.

Atomic number

Nevertheless, in spite of Rutherford's estimation that gold had a central charge of about 100 (but was element Z = 79 on the periodic table), a month after Rutherford's paper appeared, Antonius van den Broek first formally suggested that the central charge and number of electrons in an atom was exactly equal to its place in the periodic table (also known as element number, atomic number, and symbolized Z).


Bohr model

In 1913 Henry Moseley found an empirical relationship between the strongest X-ray line emitted by atoms under electron bombardment (then known as the K-alpha line), and their atomic number Z. Moseley's empiric formula was found to be derivable from Rydberg and Bohr's formula (Moseley actually mentions only Ernest Rutherford and Antonius Van den Broek in terms of models).


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