WOOL AND SCIENCE

Press, Volume LXVI, Issue 20089, 19 November 1930, Page 16

WOOL AND SCIENCE

EXPERTS SEE RESEARCH centre. h'EOil 4 SrBCIAI. CoBRESPOKOEK'I WJiat science is doing for wool was discussed by delegates to the Imperial Wool Research Conference when they made a tour of inspection of the laboratories of the Wool Industries Research Association at Torridon, l.eeds, last month. The Wool Conference, which was convened by the Empire Marketing Board, was attended by representatives of Australia, New Zealand. South Africa, Canada, the Irish Eree State, Palestine, and Kenya, the United Kingdom, and the Empire Marketing Board. The laboratories at Torridon. Leeds, set. up by the Wool Industries Research Association, comprise the largest and most complete wool research centre in the Empire. Tliey deal with wool in all its aspects right, from the sheep s back to man's. At every stage in the lonf chain of events between the two the"scientist is busy improving technical details, trving to discover what wool really consists of. and how breeder and manufacturer can best exploit ils natural advantage?. Empire Team-Work.

The three New Zealand delegates, Dr. K. Marsden, Mr D. J. Sidey, and Mr \. Wright, were able to discuss with Dr. S. G. Barker, director of research, lines of co-operation with Tvew Zealand research workers, ami plans wefc laid l'or extended Empire team-work. Co-operative pieces of work have been carried out, as, for instance, recent tests of an all-paper wool pack which, if it proves strong enough, should get over the present difficulty of pieces of jute getting mixed with the wool iu the bah'. "Tlie main object of the research at Torridon is to evolve definite standards of wool quality which will enable the manufacturer to tell the farmer just what tvpes of wool ho wants, and which will enable the farmer to know what to aim at in production," said Mr J. H. Thomas in hi'S opening speech at the Conference. As the link between farm and mill, Torridon carries out two main types of work —it examines wool fibre to lind the chemical basis for qualities which affect the manufacturing properties of wool, such as elasticity, strength, crimp, regain, and so on; and it turns to the producing end and finds out how wool quality can be influenced by the breeder.

Growing Wool on a Watch Glass. In the biology department delegates to the Conference were shown hair growing on a watch-glass instead of on an animal's back. A woman scientist has taken tiny grafts of'skin from an embryonic guinea-pig and persuaded them to continue their growth in a glass dish for two or three weeks. The hairs have, in many cases, doubled and trebled their length. They are provided with nourishment in the form of blood plasma and extracts of embryo—sometimes yolk of egg. . . The object of this work, which is financed by the Umpire Marketing Board, is to find out why hair grows. These experiments have shown that its growth depends upon the follicle—the special mother-cell which gives rise to all hairs —rather than on the animal's nervous or blood S3*stem. The next step is to find out what substances make hair grow most rapidly. One day these results will be linked up with the feeding of the sheep; and possibly comfort for the man who is getting "a little thin on top" may yet come out- of the wool research laboratories.

In the biochemistry section the delepates were particularly interested in the work of a young chemist, Dr. Rinimington, who has obtained the lirst defi-

special diets rich in cystine and determining their effect on the wool is now being followed out in co operation with I>r J B. Orr, of the Tlowett Kesearch "Institute, Aberdeen, the animal nutrition centre. If this develops, farmers will one day be able to control the quality of the fleece by feeding. All sorts of now devices have been evolved by scientists at Torridon. One invention is an artificial silk made largely out of wool. Woo] "tops" are dissolved in a chemical and out of the solution the scientist conjures a totally different material which looks like artificial fibre, but which is softer, and more like real silk to handle. This process has been patented, and may lead to a useful new outlet being found for wool. Jn this way, and in many others, l'rofessor Barker's team is showing the manufacturer that research pays. The income of the Association, which is supported mainly by the manufacturers themselves with a subsidy from the British Government, has gone up every year that it has been in existence. Twelve years ago the Association owned one room in a Leeds ooic,e; to-day it owns what are probably the best equipped wool laboratories in the world, anil spends £'25,000 a year on researeh.