Science Siftings

New Zealand Tablet, 21 January 1915, Page 41

Science Siftings

By * Volt.’

The Promise of Peat,

When coal is gone peat promises to take its place—and more. The peat bogs of Ireland cover • about 2,831,000 acres, estimated to contain 39,972,000,000 tons of fuel of the value of £850,000,000; Scotland has great deposits; and in England and Wales there are some 6,000,000 acres. Apathy in utilising this great national resource may be attributed to the abundance of coal. Chief among the products of peat are peat fuel and peat charcoal, with such by-products as naphtha, sulphate of ammonia, acetic acid, tar, and paraffin wax, but there are also moss litter, manure, preservatives, and sheep dips, paper, cardboard and millboards, disinfectants, artificial wool, surgical wool, and filtering and absorbing material. Though supplying antiseptic wools and dressing, the special medicinal value rests in use for peat baths.

A Huge Telescope.

The Westminster Gazette says that if the new Canadian observatory to be erected on Vancouver Island is fortunate enough to be equipped with the proposed 73in telescope, it will possess an instrument exceeding by exactly one inch the famous Bosse 6ft reflecting telescope at Parsonstown, Ireland, and By over a foot any other telescope at present in existence. A lOOin telescope has been planned for the Mount Wilson Observatory, but failure has attended several attempts to produce the necessary glass disc, Bft 4in .in diameter and a foot thick, on which already some £IO,OOO has been spent. It is probable that similar difficulties will be met with in producing a disc for the mirror of the Canadian giant telescope, as the polishing difficulties to be overcome in producing the correct ‘ figure ’ increase enormously with quite small increases in the diameter of the glass disc.

A Hundred Years Ago.

The only matches sold in London 100 years ago were cedar splints tipped with a paste of chlorate of potash and sugar. On dipping one of these into a little bottle containing asbestos wetted with sulphuric .acid, and withdrawing it, a flame burst forth. Fifty .in a box, together with the bottle, were sold for a shilling. The matches invented by John Walker in 1827—the first to ignite on sandpaper—were sold at the same price. Owing to the damage caused by the heads flying off, after ignition, the use of these matches was prohibited in France and Germany. Six years later came the invention of lucifers, the first matches with phosphorus in their composition. These, too, were originally. sold at a shilling a box, and when in course of time the price fell to a penny a motto from Paradise Lost was suggested for the. boxes, ‘O, Lucifer! how greatly art thou fallen

Radium in the Upper Air.

Hess, of the Vienna Radium Institute, has recently published the results of some remarkable experiments. He has investigated the penetrating radiation which, occurs- in the upper atmosphere by means of balloon ascents, and he arrives at the startling conclusion that at a height exceeding 2000 metres there is a rapid increase in the intensity of the penetrating rays. At these heights the penetrating rays from the earth itself would be absolutely negligible, while that from the radium emanation in the air, which has its origin in the earth and is of limited life, must be, at any rate, less than at the surface. So that it would seem we must assure .some extra terrestrial source for these radiations. The conclusion that a great part of the penetrating radiation cannot come from the known radio-active constituents of the earth and atmosphere is one Uiat must evoke general interest, and calls for the further radioactive exploration of the upper atmosphere.