In the gold foil experiment of Geiger and Marsden, that paved the way for Rutherford’s model of an atom, ~1.00% of the a-particles were found to deflect at angles > 50°. If one mole of a-particles were bombarded on the gold foil, compute the number of a-particles that would deflect at angles less than 50°.

% of a-particles deflected more than 50° = 1% of a-particles.

% of a-particles deflected less than 50° = 100 – 1 = 99%

Number of particles that deflected at an angle less than 50

= 99\over100 × 6.022 × 1023

= 596.178\over100 × 1023

= 5.96 x 1023

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