X-RAY MAGIC.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXVI, Issue 17936, 2 August 1920, Page 4

X-RAY MAGIC.

SAPPHIRES TRANSFORMED INTO RUBIES. Discoveries concerning the action of radium on gems by which sapphires can be transformedyiuto rubies and the ordinary precious stones can be invested with the brilliance of the diamond are reported by Dr T. Coke Squance, of Sunderland. whose researches in fadiotherapeutics have been of the greatest value. “I have succeeded in transforming a sapphire of faint pink hue into a beautiful ruby,” states Dr Squance. “and during the process the lustre was increased to such an extent that the stone has almost the brilliance of the diamond. “While experimenting with X-rays and radium in the dark,” continued Dr Squance, “I noticed that a diamond in a ring I had laid down near the apparatus glowed with a beautiful green. This led me to experiment in phosphorescence, and I discovered that both X-rays and radium make the diamond glow with this green light, and besides the diamond, only one other substance so behaves —a mineral called kunzite, found in America, which glows with a lovely ruby hue. I submitted a sapphire to the radium rays for a long period, and it turned to a glorious red. In tact, it had become a ruby, for thn sapphire and ruby are chemically the same. I have similarly transI formed other stones, a faint green [sapphire, for instance, turning tatA lan Oriental emerald.”