SCIENCE JOTTINGS

New Zealand Times, Volume LII, Issue 12249, 22 September 1925, Page 11

SCI ENCE JOTTINGS

NATURAL GEYSER STEAM Natural steam, delivered through 200 feet of Bin. iron pipe, has been several months driving a 35 kilowatt turbogenerator in the geyser-power experiments of the United States General Electric Company. The steam is found to be 99 per cent, pure, and to have a steady pressure oi 601 b to 701 b with a temperature of S3sdeg. F. at the outlet nozzles. It i@ estimated that a town of 2000 inhabitants 15 miles away can he supplied with electricity from natural steam at one-half or one-third of the cost of electricity from artificial steam or water power. NEW SILVER ALLOY Tf A new alloy of sterling silver which will not tarnish except under the worst tests, is of good colour, and is easily handled, has been developed by a Sheffield firm. There is 92} per cent, of silver in the alloy. Under tests at the university the alloy only faintly discoloured after 15 minutes, while standard silver tarnished in two minutes, and was black in 15, and fine silver, known as coloured standard silver, tarnished in five minutes to deep yellow, and in 15 minutes to orange. Another remarkable point was that the faint colour on the alloy was entirely removed by wiping with leather, and without rubbing. Tested in a sulphur atmosphere the alloy resisted 30 times as much exposure as ordinary silver. EGGS AND CHICKENS The American Department of Agriculture has announced that one cannot bet on the sex of a chicken within by the length, shape, or weight of an egg. Scientists, however, it was explained, are able to tell the sex of the chicken in the shell after seven or eight days of incubation. An investigation by Dr M. A. Jull, poultry husbandman, has proved beyond doubt that there is nothing in the contention that the long, slim, heavy eggs produce male chickens and the small and shorter ones pullets. “It has been determined, however/’ says Dr Jull, “that the greater the number of eggs a hen lays before being put into the breeding pen the larger will he the proportion of females and the smaller the proportion of males produced by her eggs.” ORE IN SWEDEN By their unique electrical prospecting methods Swedish mining engineers have located for the Government valuable ore fields in the northern part of that country. The newly-discovered deposits contain copper, arsenic, zinc, and even gold in small quantities. These successful methods of location are based on the greater conductivity of beds of ore than of the surrounding rock. At one point a deposit of copper pvrite was located 30ft down under a sandy plain nearly two miles from the nearest ore-containing bowlders. ' At another place a mother lode containing 7 per cent, of copper was found under a frozen lake, below 30ft of water and 10ft of mud. The Lund-berg-Nathorst method utilises electric-ally-charged wires laid in shallow trenches. Through a telephone tho prospectors literally “listen out” tho presence of ore.