El Paso herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1901-1931, 1910-02-05
DELICATE SCIENTIFIC
IN 5TRUMENTS.
MACHINES NOW MEASURE HEAT OF STARS
M :

n n ANKIND owes great debt to
MI the men whose ingenuity has
produced instruments which
permit the scientist to go far beyond
the ordinary range of his senses.
Through the modern telescope the sci
enlist looks far into space and beholds
millions of suns Outshining our own,
objects of such immensely that our
minds cannot grasp them. and Of such
distance that the unaided eye cannot
see them. Through the microscope he
discovers billions of little creatures Of
whose existence he was unaware.
With his measuring instruments the
scientist is able to measure distance and
quantity a million times more accurate
ly than with the eye; heat thousand
times more accurately than with the
sense Of feeling; and time thousand
times more accurately than with the
unaided mind.
Heat of the Stars.
The bolometer, devised by the late
professor Langley to measure the heat
of the stars, is a marvellous instrument.
The heat of the average star is no
greater to us than the heat of a candle
placed three miles away, yet this deli
cate instrument will measure the vary
ing degrees of heat given off by differ
ent stars
A spiders web. a thread of spun
=
mirror as small as pin head, are some
of the things that enter into its con-
struction. 1t is so sensitive to heat that
the image of a mans face thrown upon
1t at distance of a half mile wiz be
registered sharply
Dividing Engine
The dividing engine, used by scien-
lists to make spectroscope gratings for
analyzing rays of light. is perhaps the
next most delicate machine man has
contrived. The Rowland dividing en-
CINE will rule 12O, 900 parallel lines on
a single inch of surface. Another Will
draw IA lines on the edge of the finest
tissue paper. 1t was almost an insuper-
able task to get the wheels perfect
enough to do the work, but a little cleo
troplating brush of the most ingenious
construction finally served the purpose.
When the machine is in operation it
must be let alone, as even the proxim-
fly of human being will interfere with
the trueness of it's lines. 1t goes on in
cessantly drawing its diamond point
across the hardened steel, and when
the grating is finished ii sells for as
much as $50 per square inch
Measuring Machines.
Another very perfect machine IS the
Whiteworth measuring machine, which
will determine thickness down to the
mfllionth part of an inch. When one
desires such a degree Of accuracy 1t is
an easy matter to set the machine
shade too tight. To overcome this the
inventor placed a pair of "feelers" on
1t, enabling the operator tell when II
is exactly right
The machine is so accurate that II
man places his finger nail against a
bar OF iron SO inches long, it will regis
ter the expansion caused by the COM
municated heat.
The Shaw measuring machine will
determine length down to the hundred
miIlionth part OF an inch. AS the series
of wheels on a watch multiply the mo-
ton of a single turn of the handspring
into thousands of revolutions by the
balance wheel, so there is a series of
little levers in the Shaw machine which
reduce the movement of an inch on the
lever operated by the hand to the hun
dred-miIlionth part Of an inch on the
one at the other end of the series.
One well NAV wonder how such an
instrument can be turned to human use,
yet 1t was this machine which discov-
cred that the vibration of the dia-
phragm in a telephone receiver, in reg
istering the faintest audible sound,
moves through the one-fifty-milliOnth
part Of an inch This machine Is. so
delicate that unaided human perception
cannot interpret its registrations.
therefore a small microphonie tele-
phone has been attached to II for this
purpose These measuring machines
were used to determine the length of
the tuberculosis germ.
The Spectroscope.
One of the greatest aids to human
knowledge is the spectToscope. In It's
simplest form this instrument is a tri-
angular prism through which the sun
shines revealing the colors of the rain
bow In its complex form it takes the
shape of telescope broken in two. with
the two parts placed at about the an
gle of the two marks Of the letter Y.
except that they do not join at the
apex Instead there are a number Of
prisms placed between them. which
bend the ray of light going into one
barrel until the eve can behold IL while
looking in the corresponding end of the
other barrel.
The powers Of this instrument seem
almost miraculous. It will discover the
presence of millionth # a
grain OF sodium. while the human taste
can perceive only the presence OF one
part of salt in few hundred parts OF
water. It can take the thousanith part
of a grain of dried human bl 10d. which
has been exposed to the air for 50 years,
and show by the chara cteristic lines
that IT is blood-and human blood at
that.
1t can take a ray Of light coming
from star so distant that the ray has
been years in reaching here, and divide