Editing Atomic orbital (section)

=== Early models ===
With [[J. J. Thomson]]'s discovery of the electron in 1897,<ref name="referenceC">{{cite journal|first= J. J. |last=Thomson |year=1897|title=Cathode rays|journal=Philosophical Magazine|volume= 44|page=293|doi= 10.1080/14786449708621070|issue= 269|url=https://zenodo.org/record/1431235 }}</ref> it became clear that atoms were not the [[Elementary particle|smallest building blocks of nature]], but were rather composite particles. The newly discovered structure within atoms tempted many to imagine how the atom's constituent parts might interact with each other. Thomson theorized that multiple electrons revolve in orbit-like rings within a positively charged jelly-like substance,<ref>{{cite journal|first=J. J.|last= Thomson |title=On the Structure of the Atom: an Investigation of the Stability and Periods of Oscillation of a number of Corpuscles arranged at equal intervals around the Circumference of a Circle; with Application of the Results to the Theory of Atomic Structure |url=http://www.chemteam.info/Chem-History/Thomson-Structure-Atom.html | doi = 10.1080/14786440409463107 |journal=[[Philosophical Magazine]] |series=Series 6 |volume=7 |issue=39 |pages=237–265 |format=extract of paper|year=1904}}</ref> and between the electron's discovery and 1909, this "[[plum pudding model]]" was the most widely accepted explanation of atomic structure.

Shortly after Thomson's discovery, [[Hantaro Nagaoka]] predicted a different model for electronic structure.<ref name="Nagaoka 1904 445–455" /> Unlike the plum pudding model, the positive charge in Nagaoka's "Saturnian Model" was concentrated into a central core, pulling the electrons into circular orbits reminiscent of Saturn's rings. Few people took notice of Nagaoka's work at the time,<ref>{{cite book|last=Rhodes| first = Richard| title = The Making of the Atomic Bomb| publisher = Simon & Schuster| year = 1995| pages = 50–51| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=aSgFMMNQ6G4C&q=making+of+the+atomic+bomb| isbn = 978-0-684-81378-3}}</ref> and Nagaoka himself recognized a fundamental defect in the theory even at its conception, namely that a classical charged object cannot sustain orbital motion because it is accelerating and therefore loses energy due to electromagnetic radiation.<ref>{{cite journal|first=Hantaro|last=Nagaoka|title=Kinetics of a System of Particles illustrating the Line and the Band Spectrum and the Phenomena of Radioactivity|journal=Philosophical Magazine|date=May 1904|volume=7|issue=41|page=446|url=http://www.chemteam.info/Chem-History/Nagaoka-1904.html|doi=10.1080/14786440409463141|access-date=30 May 2009|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171127144221/http://www.chemteam.info/Chem-History/Nagaoka-1904.html|archive-date=27 November 2017|url-status=dead}}</ref> Nevertheless, the [[Saturnian model]] turned out to have more in common with modern theory than any of its contemporaries.