Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1874-04-29
Aerial MicrOscODy.

A British microscopic has recently
published the results of extensive ex-
periments in this novel but intensely
interesting domain of science The
microscopic examination of air, it has
long been promised, would afford many
clues to the origin of the great epidem-
les. and also solve many interesting
| points of medical and agricultural eli
matology. Agreatphysician has shown
that we take into our lungs daily from
| 1000 to 1900 gallons of air. The de-
lection of impurities in the air, and the
discovery of their sanitary effect is of
the utmost practical moment.
In the experiments of Mr.. Douglas
| Cunningham, now referred to, thespec-
linens of air were taken in the tropical
atmosphere near Calcutta, in thin brass
tubes. Among the chief conclusions
| reached we find that infusorial animal
| cules, their germ and ova, are almost
entirely absent from atmospheric dust.
| No connection could be traced between
the number of germs found present in
the air and the prevalence Of cholera,
dysentery, diarrhma, ague, and other
diseases. Although this latter conclu-
sion seems to discourage the hope If
connecting the origin of disease with
atmospheric germs and apparently up
sets Professor Tyndall's famous theory
of the relation between "dust and dis
ease,' the experiments were not ex-
haustive, and refer only to aerial parti-
cles distinguishable while in the air.
Countless finer molecules, perhaps
peopled with living beings, may and
doubtless will be found present in the
air. That the air is itself heavily
freighted with infusorial life, capable
Of affecting the human system, as we
know it often fatally affects vegetation,
has long since been established. In 1863
Pasteur, the eminent French microsco-
pist, investigated the diseased silk
worms, upon whose health and labors
the prosperity of the empire largely de-
pended. Although the microscope could
not detect the plague corpuscles in the
fertile egg Of the silk worm, and the
scientist was at first baffied, he soon
conjectured that the worm and it's in
fusorial parasite grew. together, and the
tests confirmed his conjecture At a
later stage of the development he was
enabled to wash the claws of the dis
eased worms, and, under the lens, east
ly found the enlarged plague corpus
cles. It is we'll known that in wounds
where the blood is mixed with air that
has passed through the lungs there is
less danger of putrefaction, since the air
has thus been filtered It is obvious
that the deposition of organic matter
and infusoria in the respiratory organs
must be great source of disease, es-
pecially pulmonary, and in this re-
search has an immense practical sig
nificance. The discovery of Mr.. Doug
las Cunningham, that these swarms of
atmospheric infusoria do not make the
dust particles they habitant SO much,
as that they live independently of them,
is OF especial interest to the denizens of
our large and dusty cities. It may be
hasty to assume that the animacular
life examined by Pasteur was derived
from the air, and that it may not have
been extinct in vegetable surfaces with
which the silk worm had been inocula-
ted by contact. But, at any rate, the
atmosphere is the medium Of transit for
these organisms, and the microscopic
and chemical analysis of the air in the
various geographical zones and special
localities would richly repay the inves-
togator.