Beyond are steaming troughs where fibers are washed for processing. The paintings on these pages trace in 20 basic steps how air, natural gas and ammonia are transformed into bales of Acrilan staple. A water spray prevents the unstable acetylene from decomposing. But the acetylene is absorbed by the solvent and carried to the bottom. Rising as a vapor out of the stripper, pure acrylonitrile is cooled back to liquid in another condenser and shipped to Decatur by tank car.
Power hammers break it up for packaging after it has hardened.
Although all U.S. industry leans more and more heavily on research, none spends so much on it or relies so fundamentally on it as the chemical industry. Like all the other companies, Monsanto knows it could not long survive the intense competition without a continual stream of new chemicals for its customers. The chemists who provide Monsanto with 42 new products a year work with tools ranging from vacuum cleaners to the radioactive chambers of Mound Laboratory, Miamisburg, Ohio. Most of their discoveries come about by deliberate planning. Monsanto's President Thomas, an amateur gardener, puts his research chemists to work to, find a chemical that would keep soil loose and crumbly for better plant growth.