MODERN SGIENGE

New Zealand Times, Volume LI, Issue 11935, 16 September 1924, Page 4

MODERN SGIENGE

NATURE’S WIRELESS STATIONS. CLASHING OF THE WAVES; Gonera-l Negrei, Chief Signal Officer of the Rumanian army, has reported to his Government that, in his opinion., the recent terrible explosion at Cotroceni was due to the. accidental clashing of the ordinary radio waves, sent out from high-power stations between which Cotroceni happened to He. Further, he believes that some previous explosions in Rumania were caused by the same influences. Almost simultaneously cqme nows of two or three persons who received shocks white sheltering under a tree to which, an. aerial wire Was attached. “General Negrei’s theory,” says an English Writer, “will not be dismissed by Governments without investigation, \ put there appear to ho many flaws in his argument. The newspaper reports of his remarks would lead one to belibve that the clashing of wireldas Wares was but an occasional affair, and that ,bn the recent unfortunate occasion the Cotroceni munitions •depot happened to be the accidental rendezvous. Actually the wireless waves of many stations are constant'y blushing or crossing one another’s paths. “Wireless waves wore-doing this long before Marconi found a commercial use for them. Every thundercloud is a natural wireless station; some thunderclouds ate wireless (Stations of great power—their signals can bo lieard half way across the world. The waves from these natural wireless stations hiaive been clashing} and' passing through one another from the first days of the World.” The writer proceeds: “The great Handicap to the investigator of an explosion is the thoroughness with which ’all dues as to origin are wiped out. ■ Those who are best acquainted with modern high explosives' will resort to the chemical laboratory for the cause of the Cbti-toeni disaster. Wliat anSWer is there to the assertion that persons, Hot possessing one pennyworth. Of gunpowder between them. Were AhooktiJ electrically and painfully while standing by a tree carrying a. wireless Serial ? “This can be said: To stand by any tree during a thunderstorm is Unwise, beCaUse trees do attract lightning owing to the path offered to the electric ditehargq. However, most of the shocks experienced’ by persons during a 'thunderstorm. do not come from the lightning flash from dev to earth, but from the earth itself. These peojwe are the victims of the backlash or return shook, and one need not to sheltering .benwatli a tree to experienco it.” “BIG BERTHA” POSSIBILITIES. “Recent technical progress in the ■arte of. Warfare places London under tile permanent menace of destruction by aerial bombardment and by German long-range gutis,” This is the warning of an article in the “Revue de France” qy a distinguished French ordnance expert., M P, BOungoin, one of the 'senior engineers of the . Naval Artillery Reserve. A reneWed German offensive which fell far short of the German success in 1914 Would he quite sufficient, he points out, to bring London under the fire of “Big Berthas.” The arp of a circle with a radius of 120 tniles based on London as its centre, would comprise, he argues, the area from within which London could: be bombarded by a perfected long-range gun. This Would include 1 Cape GrisNez, opposite Dungertness. Which is only 78j miles in a direct line from London, and’ the whole of the French and Belgium coast between Dieppe and Nieuport. ELECTROLYTIC IRON PROCESS. ,_Mr T. W. Stainer Hutchins, M.j.E.E., . A.M.I.E.E:, of Davenham. near Norwich, ha» been experimenting bn the, production of pure iron and Other metal sheets and tubes by an electrolytic process for sewpral years, .find, hag .discovered that the hitherto accepted process upon which the satisfac’tory_ production of the metals depends m Unnecessary. Tho metal, ore, prAmap metal is brought into a liquid State by thb addition of acid. . The liUUid is then passed into special vessels or vats, where the metal is extracted from the liquid by the aid of electricity and deposited direct onto the formers, so farming at will, metal tubes or sheets. In this process , pte'tipigj” or as commonly called Smelting,” of the metal or ore is not necessary • in fact the highest temperature employed does not exceed the temperature of boiling water. CHEMISTRY CUT TO PIECES. ■ Profester H. E. Armstrong, speaking at a conference ait the Society of Chemical Industry, at Liverpool, said thiat li© they should; insist on cheuustry . being taught as a whole and not cut up unto pieces, as the universities were doing.. The pieces- were never put together gain. “It was high time,” said Armstrong, “that someone spoke out about chemistry and the Way in ■which they were specialising. He would also like to know, he added, why they did not speak iii. plain, terms what oraifiary .pooplq could understand 1 , instead of Using language which was not oomUibn sense andi Wps a jargon of the day, obscuring everything and complicatirig the tru© issue. Insulin was an example, If the. bibicheinists had only Ibren true chemists, they would have known all aibout insulin, its characteristics and action, instead of there being the pfefeent mystery. A NEW SOUND KILLER. Linoleum on ceilings is the latest cure for noises from the floor above. The: idea is based on the researches of the late Professor Wallace O. Sabine, Of Harvard University, who, in Ids dlay, was a recognised authority on acoustics. A thick layer of felt is fixed to the oeiling, and over thait linoleum ■perforated with small holes. That is, briefly, the new soinndi-killer. According to Mr Clifford Swan, a New York engineer, the most common source of acoustical trouble is reverberation, and this to-day is more true than ever owing to mddebn fireproof construction and its hard walla and plain surfaces.

MINUTENESS OF THE MOLECULE. A striking illustration of the minuteness df the molecule was given in a TOdfent lecture in England by Dr F. W. Aston, F.R.S. If a very small hole, he said, were pierced into an electric light bUtb, admitting air into the evacuated space at. the rate of one million molecules a Second, tile pressure inside would not reach that of the atmosphere until the lapse df 100 million years. Again, suppose, it were possible to "earmark” the individual molecules of a tumbler of water which Was then poured into the sea. After a few million years this water would he thoroughly mixed up with tihe rest of the Water on the earth. If then, after this thorough mixture, another tumbler of water were <jrawn anywhere on the earth, it would .contain 2000 df the original “earmarked” molecules. In fact, thdre Were 2000 times as many molecules in a tumbler of water as there were tumblers of Water in all the oceans of the earth.