RADIUM THE SPHINX.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLI, Issue 12725, 30 November 1904, Page 1 (Supplement)

RADIUM THE SPHINX.

■ - . ■ ■.'■ : ■' -■■ . ~ t ."■'. .'■;-.--".-:-'" l , : : '" ; : S; R*vpiO-ACTivity is a property of 'matter, specially; predicated of live todies, the re!eent study of whose attributes has threatened the traditional foundation.; of certain branches of physical science. ■.''Only'speak-■ ing- here of radium, which is sufficiently typical of the group, wo fall'at starting in;U the position of the cook of the immortal; ; -Mr. Glass—to make hare-soup, " first catch jour hare." Now, although "radium" (socalled) is advertised to let on hire, while its bromide is, sold in five-milligramme tubes,' costing about £8 each, tho" actual hare has' never been run' down, even ■ in the refinery built and fitted at Ivry by that cunning Polish analyst, Madame Curie,-and her ingenious hen husband. A 'cartload of 'the composite mineral known as pitchblende, being -•*. it. to yield up its chief. ingredient—viz., uranium—dwindles down to a ton of a refuse of mixed ores, which by roasting washing-, precipitating, erystsJliaug, fractionation) and Other factory and laboratory processes is reduced to a low specks of (mat residue. Bel tu is,is net our hare. The analyst will have. arrived at a radium salt, probably the ehlo* rule, bromide,- or nitrate, but he is still far, from radium !;,>:;, which" has, not yet been . rlai-i . Un tin, fundamental, fact our -.p,yoi ■ 3Colonial■ savant"( Professor Rutherford), whose researches have done so much honour to his natal New Zealand,; and* his Canadian .l-mversuy, contradicts a cloud of: witness*"*, amongst whom are, M. Curie, and a German ■ whose .ipsiasima verba show that he has' not '.'.' achieved the isolation nssuniod. In expert language, the!.term "radium" designates,"'as i a ruin, the bromide of our cryptic element, Z\ ■ or maybe its chloride- Of the last-named 1 salt, eight tons of the red pitchblende rest- "■' ' duo will yield ; 15 ■ grains /:(about's a saltspoon- v Jul); worth £25 a &rain-, ; the,bromide may ~ run-up to a selling value reckoned at 8000 times, the. price of gold. . We ■-•'.',' beg to explain that in radio-active J ; r,,. ( the word "rays" must be read in its 'Newtonian, corpuscular' sense, otherwise confusion is caused by its use. In the case of light and heat, radiation signifies tho passage of transverse vibrations through tlie'"' other of space. Applied to radium am- £ to ' ) certain of its congeners, that word virt.t;,lly': means that ,i stream of material bodirs "' >fl,'r i tin. Vadio-active source is iupuiy< • ; \. w. gre'a-v /velocity on exterior, objects, 'f, "V »■ ; the;'.;',..jjt, polonium, and uranium a j •■", w.c ipnrtieles of this description," -.Much , have been grouped as tho alpha, beta- Hrtd gamma" The A-rays can penetrate at n:o',l a sheet of paper, or a trifling layer of air, or a thin leaf of mica: and. if made to travel into a magnetic or electrical field, they bend off a little to the left. The a-rays have much more penetrative power, and are . violently deflected : from their path , to the: right by an electric current. The y-rays will pierce -> foot of iron :\ unlike their, "neighbours,' they entirely ignore magnetic fields, however intense, and they bear ■ a family likeness to • ,the Rontgen, ; . or X-rays. ■ Another* gtumb'ling-bldck of : radio-active nomenclature is the expression " emanation." . Which is often used in a very lnx manner as tile equivalent .of "rays." ' Where:..-: other .' substances' have to ' remain at rest, radium,'l says: Professor Rutherford with emphasis in ; the- ad (iiiiablo manual, on our list, '"lias th'e-' power, of constantly emitting into-the surrounding space a material t emanation which h'« all the properties of a radio-active gas." Here his disciple, Mr. Soddy, strange 'to ; say, in .the; sternly Scientific,;: though .very ' readable,' volume in : which dm; is. often too ■ : : ready fcr '■'< tho jurare in. verba magistrs, ' is lax: while Mr. Botiono (p. 22), ' whose power s as a vidian' are. matter of, notoriety, hammers--the necessary distinction into the ' reader's head. : The : " emanation," : however, >"s not - singular, " ■■ but plural, ; for ;; it emitsjft product: of its own called emanation . A. This secondary article also alters its ways,, and heads a series of successive changes, the last of. which will arrive "two hundred (?) - ; years hence while to the final: link in this ' chain Professor 'Rutherford's exact table assigns no date. Sir W. Ramsay infers from spectroscopic' evidence that, his own sun-gas, helium, now found in' terrestrial sources, is .present in the first emanation—or aro we to say. in the X-rays?— perhaps, in the original .radium atoms;: which some:guessers at truth therefore identify with helium. " The luminous qualities or our veiled , sphinx are traced" to the X-rays, which: are '■' exhibited in full activity by' the spinthnri- i scope of Sir W. Cronjjes"(whose "tribes" Jed : the way to more than one path through ' what lie- had : finely called ":■ "the shadowy ' realm between. Known and : Unknown," and, : in;; particular, to the discovery of the Roni-.: gep riys). Opposite a phospbere- cent metallic screen fixed in a. little brass b&* is poised a. needle or watch-hand, which' has been dipped, : into : a solution, of radium-nitrate. : Viewed i by the,: help of :kj magnifier through a hole in 'the .box, the screen appears as a target for | successive flights of falling stars, an effect I ascribed to the 'breaking up of the surface. j :of: the ;:;: screen into minute crystals by the. particles which reach . it,, from the : radiant ' I .needle." According to the laws of heat, as qui veiy attractive third volume well puts' , it. ; "however hot a body may be, it will i fiiKnly' become of the same temperature as its | surroundings." Contrariwise, ;■' the rebel : ; radium persistently keeps up its tempera- ! ture, several degrees (M. Curie sayjf.:sdeg. ' Fahr.) above that of tire neighbouring ob- '• jects, and, what is still more startling, if exposed to the abysses of cold which con- j vert hydrogen into a liquid, radium -meets j; the, situation by throwing- out heat in larger volumes than i.-jefore.;,: Compared with the < j million years 'allotted to grains of uranium j • -''and; thorium before the] reach their vanish- I j ing-point,: tl# life of radium is short; still,'.'■';' a' radium electroscope recently designed' would go on ; automatically ringing a bell for thirty thousand; years.:; In quantitative vi- - gour, however, radium is three hundred ; million times ahead of its strongest rivals, a calculation less intelligible than the fact that two pounds of: the article would suffice to: J take large liner across the Atlantic."-.',- . Radium, then, never ceases to emit energy in the form of light, and ,i& perpetually bombarding its surroundings with minute particles of its' substance, acting . .ax .the same ~ time as. a regenerative furnace,-which', though :j; 'without apparent^apparatus for renewals, is j .■warranted-to retain ?i<s hcat» energy for more [ :'/■'.}._ ''■;'•'.. :':■■■; ■-■ ..'-■■ ,- v V'X'"''\_-J:. ' [.', .■;;:-.-:,■;

than two thousand years. Professor .Rutherford and' Mr. Soddy, behind whom ;: is arrayed a, powerful, phalanx of scientific opinion, an ultra-hypothetical solution ]of ,-.this 'double conundrum. 'They-alleg© that th© corpuscles of the radium atom are; constantly colliding:. thus developing a state of chronio friction and-"disruption competent to furnish the phenomenal energies of heat and motion . wbi'cb. : the I: radium displays. This belief, though accepted with considerable limitations : by Sir W- : Crookcs, is ' repudiated : as '. revolutionary by Lord: Kelvin, who will not even entertsu*;/ the idea of the. disintegration theory, as a working hypothesis.- Noting- the OurieKutherl'oi'd estimate of the tremendous pace at ..which'.ra'diuiHi.' spits forth heat for about ■ a year, the veteran:"'head and front" of Bri» ; tish, and indeed of Europeah/'physieal science 1 says that if"-this amazing emission really lasts irf.mtli''.after month, fresh > energy, must somehow be supplied '■from- without,- otherwise the caloinetrie apparatus of the atoms must fall out of working order. In other, words, the requisite stoking i* done by the waves, of tlia" ether which bring the. furnace frest* loads.of ©nersfy ad v libitum. 'Still-more conservative sim the eminent M. Bertbebt and bis followers, who assert that the " new " !ic-aciivil't js: possessed by almost all known , --- - and that radium, 1 ':<.< phosli'.wc, icrivcs-jti emsrgy from the. „:r. '*.- Tlfo'Speciator.:'.'-:-:.-': 1 , *- '■ .- r. J < .. ~■■*■ '