SCIENTISTS' DREAM

Evening Post, Volume CIII, Issue 123, 27 May 1922, Page 7

SCIENTISTS' DREAM

iWAYj TO TRANSMUTE" ELEMENTS

SIR- E^RUTHERFORD'S-'AiGHIEyE-

MENTj

The ■ of * d6i&£rifiJß> ■ the dream of both charlatans and scientists for nearly a thousand years, has actually been accomplished by the lecent work of Sir Ernest Butherford, and his results are generally, accepted by scientists and physicist^ according ,to. Dr. ; i James / Kendall, Associate Professor of Chemistry at Columbia,;. who said, on the other hand, that there was not the slightest reason to believe that the Germans had accomplished their reported feat of making synthetic gold. Nitrogen, sodinm, aluminum, chlorine, oxygen, and carbon have been transmuted, or broken up by Eutherford into hydrogen and helium, according to Dr. Kendall, : ; , .. , : This was first accomplished, according to the claims of Rutherford, ,by bom- , barding nitrogen gas with the alpha, rays or radium. ' These so-called rays are helium atoms which, are flung out of the exploding radium atom with an energy incomparably greater than-any projectile produced artificially. The velocity of this atom would take it around the world in,slightly less than a secondhand the power t>f the exploding atom, in proportion to. size^ is something like a million times greater •"than that of trinitrotoluol. " ■■"."' " '■'■ '.'.

EESULT OS",A CHEMICAL1 COLLISION.

The .radium was placed so as to drive the alpha particles into nitrogen gas. When the alpha particle had a 1 head^n collision with a. nitrogen jatbm it: tore it to pieces, so it is asserted. ' The atom supposedly -has a- structure somewhat resembling the solar system.. Its centre is a nucleus of positive electricity, resembling the sun of the solar system, and this is surrounded by electrons,, or charges of negative electricity, presumably whirling about the nucleus, as the planets whirl about the sun. " ■'. '•■!.'' The'alpha particle; is believed to. produce such a disruption in the atom as might occur,; for instance; if'another star of the dimensions of the sug! tore through our system, hit the^sun. directly and ; drove it,off into space; causing. the planets to shoot off in^ all" directions. ! This occurs on a scale. in, the neighbourhood of the billionth'part of.;a billionth of an inch, but it-can be partly measured. The alpha particles thrown off by radium produce scintillations when they strike a screen of zinc sulphide within a certain distance. By his study of these scintillations Dr., Rutherford was able to prove to the satisfaction of men of science generally that new products were developed Tbj^the shattering of the nitrogen atoms, and that these products were hydrogen and helium atoms. His experiments have all been in the way of disorganising the more complex atoms into simpler ones. The transmutation" of atoms with! simple structures into those with more.complex ones has not been achieved.

DR. KENDALL ON RUTHERFORD.

i "Rutherford has reduced nitrogen, aluminium, chlorine, and sodium to hydrbgenand helium," said Dr. Kendall. " He has ,also, produced helium atoms by tearing oxygen and carbon"to/pieces, but hydrogen has not 'resulted, ; T believe,, from the disruption of these atoms. " This is certainly the transmutation of elements, but it is done on an infinitely; small scale, and is important at present only to the scientific man. It does not promise that elements can ba changed from one type to- another, except on the smallest laboratory scale. _ It ■does npt suggest that the transmutation of metals may be-developed from it;: ; . " As. to; the' reports from, Germany that gold has been produced by the transmutation of elements^'there is nothing to it at all. It is all nonsense." This- report was based on the statement of Dr. Irving Fisher, the noted American economist, who . recently stated in England that he had been in-, formed by "a • highly ■ educated professional man," i who had the information direct from the 'discoverer, that the process of making gold by transmutation was known in Germany. Dt Fisher said that he knew nothing of the alleged method by which this was accomplished, and that he was interested in its only M an' economist, ' not as a chemist or physicist. „ . .'.'./:.

RESULTS OF THE DISCOVERY.

The possible far-reaching result* of Rutherford's discovery were discussed as follows bs Professor 0. W. Richardson in his recent presidential address to the Section of Mathematics and- Physics of the British Association:

"Butherford has taken the direct method of bombarding the nuclei of the different atoms with the "equally* minute high-velocity helium nuclei (alpha particles) given off by radio-active substances, and examining the tracks of any other particles which may be generated as a result of the imjiact'. . . ' . ' . "A careful and critical examination of the results shows that the hydrogen- nuclei are thus espelled from the nuclei'of a number of atoms, such as nitrogen and phosphorus. On the other hand, oxygen and carbon do not eject hydrogen under these circumstances, although there is evidence in tho case of oxygen and nitrogen of the expulsion,of other1 subnuclei whose precise structure isa matter for further inquiry.

„ "The artificial transmutation of, the chemical elements is thus ah established fact.' The natural transmutation has) of course, been familiar for some years' to students of radio-activity. The Philosopher's Stone, one of the alleged chimeras of the medieval alchemists, is thus within our reach. "But this is only part of the story. s It appears that in some cases the kinetic energy of the ejected fragments i« greater than that of the bombarding, particles. This means that these bombardments are able to release the energy which is stored up in ihe nuclei of atoms. ENERGY OF HIGH POWER, "Now vre 'know from the amount'-ofj heat liberated in. radioactive disintegra-M tion that the amount of energy stored in the nuclei of a higher order of naagritude, some millions of times greater, in fact, than that generated by any chamicsl reaction such as the combustion of coal. "In ihis comparison, of course, it is the amount of energy per mass unit of reacting or disintegrating; matter which is under consideration. The amounts of energy which have been thus far rele»«ed by artificial disintegration of tie nnclei are themselves smal], l>ut they arc enormous in comparison ■with tho minute amount of matter affected.

"If these effects can be sufficiently intensified there appear to be twq poesi-: bilities. Either they-will prove •'iincon trollable, which would presumably spell the end of aU things, or they^will not. If they can be both intensified *nd controlled, t&en we shall have at our disposal an almost iHiinitabte supply of power which will entirely transcend > anything hitherto known. It is too early yet-to say whether the necessary conditions are capable of being realised in practice, lint I see no eltiments in the problemwhich would justify ■us in denying the possK bility of this. It may bo that we-are at the beginning of a: new age, waich will be referred to as the age >.-f subatomic, power. W« cannot f»v; titno alone yM *eH."