IN THE ATOM

Greymouth Evening Star, 26 July 1923, Page 8

IN THE ATOM

ENERGY LOCKED UP. “The hint which, has often been given of late that it may be possible some day to utilise the vast store ot energy locked up in the internal constitution of the atom of matter has aroused a good deal of —probably premature —interest, for at present no one knows how to get at anytmng beyond the small amount which some atoms themselves dispense in a leisuiely manner,” writes Sir Oliver Lodge in the “Daily Mail.” “Nevertheless, the electrical theoiy of matter, as well as certain facts of observation, show that the energy is there, and further show that if we ever became able to build atoms un we might be able to get at a small fraction of it. “But however small the fraction, even if it. were only one part in a million, the amount thus accessible would be extraordinarily great. “We have only recently been taught by Sir Ernest Rutherford how to knock an atom to pieces. A few years ago that seemed impossible, though it was known that atoms sometimes fired off particles spontaneously.

“But knocking at atom to pieces can hardly be said to liberate its energy. A certain amount of energy is required to do it. We have to look rather to the inverse process—the building up of a complex atom from a simpler one in order to obtain a supply of energy, and that building up no one has yet learned how to do. “To take the simplest example of all. It is pretty well known now, from Ashton’s researches, that atoms are built up of hydrogen, or, at any rate, of hydrogen and helium, speaking roughly, and that, accordingly, the weight of every atom is a multiple of the weight of the hydrogen atom—at Prout long ago surmised. “But the mutiple, though very nearly an integer, is not an exact integer. When hydrogen atoms arc packed together tightly, so as to form a compound atom, the'y lose a little in weight; they seem to fall from 1.007 to 1. That is to say, they lose seven parts in a thousand merely by being packed closely together. “The electrical theory of matter’ shows why this should happen, though it would take rather long to explain. And the theory of relativity strongly makes the suggestion that directly matter disappears energy reappears. Or, in other words—not quite orthodox words —that matter is an energetic arrangement in the ether of space; that there is a large amount of intrinsic etherial energy in its constitution —indeed, that it is coniposed of nothing else. Consequently we may expect that in some way or other, not yet by any means worked out, energy of ether, on the one. hand, and ordinary matter on the other, are interchangeable, and that it we could pack hydrogen atoms closely together, let us say four of them, so as to make an atom of helium, every one of them would have lost seven parts in a thousand of its mass or inertia, and that a corresponding amount of energy would be liberated

"But why should that energy be so great? That is because the velocity of light is involved. A mere fragment of a grain of matter moving with the speed of light would have terrific energy, and everything points to the belief that the ether which has been somehow modified into matter is so modified because it is circulating with the velocity of light. So if any portion of matter goes out of its ordinary material existence, we may expect the coriesponding amount of energy to make its appearance. “The problem is how to do it that is, how to cause the transformation to occur, and it seems likely to remain a problem for a good time ahead.”