THE SECRET OF THE ATOM

Dominion, Volume 22, Issue 53, 26 November 1928, Page 10

THE SECRET OF THE ATOM

BRITISH EXPEDITION TO MALAYA Dominion Special Service. London, October 17. A new attempt to solve .the secret, of the atom is to be made by British scientists in the jungle of the Malay Peninsula. It is hoped that important spectroscopic examinations will be made at a total eclipse of the sun on May 9 next year. An attempt will also be made to measure the temperatures and pressures of gases round the sun, which cannot be reproduced in any laboratory. The four scientists, who have been appointed by the joint permanent committee of the Royal Society and the Royal Astronomical Society, are Dr. J. Jackson and Mr. P. J. Melotte, of Greenwich, and Colonel F. J. M. Stratton and Dr. Carroll, of Cambridge. They sail in February. The belt of totality—the band of earth along which the full eclipse is visible —will stretch across the north of Sumatra, the Malay Peninsula, the southern portion of Indo-China, and the Philippine Islands, to end in the Pacific. Dr. Jackson and Dr. Carroll (of the Solar Physics Laboratory, Cambridge), will make their headquarters at Alor Star, in the Malay State of Kedah, on the western side of the peninsula. Colonel Stratton and Mr. Melotte will eamp near Pateni, in Siam.

At last year's eclipse in England the astronomers worked in macintoshes. This time suu-helinets and shorts will be the order of the day. While at Giggleswick they only had twenty-four seconds in which to make their observatione, this time they will have close on five minutes. Dr. Carroll and Colonel Stratton will carry out the spectroscopic observations, which, it is hoped, may assist scientists to understand something of the constitution of the atom. Dr. Jackson and Mr. Melotte will attempt to reaffirm Einstein’s theory of relativity by what is known as the astronomical test.