RADIUM SCARCITY

Dominion, Volume 13, Issue 220, 11 June 1920, Page 7

RADIUM SCARCITY

—. — f FEAR OF WORLD'S SUPPLY GIVING OUT. Fears aro entertained that tho world's supply of radium is giving out, says tho "Daily Mail." - This mysterious mineral, which is more and more needed every ' week by mon of science and by doctors, !s growing harder and harder to find. The ores out of which it is extracted by long and costly processes are in many cases not turning out trumps. Borne of them, of which much was oxpocted, are proving valueless; and ( as it takes scores of tons of ore to yield a gramme, the amount of vain toil may be imagiued. Radium is now wortli £16,000 a crammo (thero ore 82 grammes to the ounco troy), and may soon rieo Far beyond this prico if richer ores aro not discovered. The Radium Institute, which inherited a certain amount of our huge supply actiuired during tho war, is preparing it for use in medical research by a strango mothod. First a solution of radium is mado. This very weak solution gives off radium emanations just as the original substance. Thoso emanations, though, of invisible and only to be detected by delicate apparatus, are then bottled, litorally bottled. Tiny glass phials aro nut in contact with tho solution and ,lhon corked'. When thus charged, they are 6ent off to any doctor who lias an annroved case. Tho officacy of tho phial lasts about a weok. These curious emanations, either from tho radium or its solution, will oscapo through every substance excopt lead. Tho activity of theso emanations, or whatever word ia used, is such that a morsel of radium, left uncnclosed by lead in any ono room of a house, can be detected by duo apparatus in any other.