Question

what are the limitations of Rutherford's model of the atom?

Answer 1

There were many limitations of Rutherford's atomic model, which were later corrected by Neils Bohr. These are some to name few:-

Rutherford proposed that electrons revolve at a high speed in circular orbits around the positively charged nucleus. When a charged particle i. e. electron revolves around positively charge nucleus, it needs to be accelerated so as to keep it moving in circular orbits. However, according to electromagnetic theory, whenever a charged particle such as an electron is accelerated around another charged center ( nucleus ) which are under force of attraction, there will be continuous radiation of energy. This loss of energy would slow down the speed of the electron. This would reduce the radius of the electron–orbit. Eventually the electron would fall into the nucleus. The result would be that the atom would collapse. But this does not happen. Thus Rutherford’s atom could not explain the stability of the atom.

Rutherford proposed that electrons revolve around the nucleus in the fixed orbits. However, he did not specify the orbits and the number of electrons in each orbit

Answer 2

Limitations of Rutherford's model of atom :-
1) he was unable to explain the stability of an atom.
2)Rutherford's theory was incomplete because he didn't mentioned anything about the arrangement of electrons in the orbitals which was one of the major drawback of Rutherford's model of atom.