The Washington herald., 1920-05-02
yates Viii Wear Cheap Cotton Gons Stay High Cost Fiend
SCIENTIFIC HEART
OPENS FOR PUBLIC
Secrets of Modern Genius Are Freely Given to
All Corners at Annual Holiday
Romp in Washington.

bIueberry plant was pushed
through a greenhouse crack and
spent the winter outdoors. 1t is in
full flower and bloom. The other
part stayed inside and Is still bare.
Many seeds. he found, do not
sprout promptly unless chilled.
The reason was most Important:
. With the chilling, he thinks, large
quantities of plant starch are slow
ly turned into sugar. and this starts
buds. This happens, he believes,
because chilling weakens the cell
walls and lets the "enzymes" that
transform starch leak through. 9th
er injuries such as pruning. cutting
rings or drying, are said to have
the same effect. They mix up the
substances that start on growth"
Bare Cable Wires Explained.
There was much for the public
besides food" and weather"
A new era in telegraphy and te-
lephony began when Mai. Gen. Geo.
o. Squier announced that single
bare wires sunk in the sea or buried
on the land will supersede the ex-
pensive, heavily insulated ocean and
land cables.
This remarkable feat was accom-
plished by Gen. Squier and his as
sistants az the Army Signal Corps.
As navy submarines already talk
with one another under water by
radio, he decided a barb wire would
at least help the connection. Sue
cessful tests proved 1t practical to
an astonishing degree.
The key problem" of the Signal
Corps during the war. says 1t head,
was to find enough machines to
insulate enormous quantities of wire
needed. The new method does away
with bulky insulated wire.
Use of the Alaskan cables to
transmit several messages all at
one time by alternating currents.
was told by Captain F. z. Pernot
With a telephone and audion re-
ceivers, he found such messages
would reach 900 miles on the best
Atlantic cables.
Telescope Called Best.
Another brilliant feature OF The
National Academy sessions was a
demonstration of the success of
the worlds greatest telescope.
Wonderful photos of the moon
and stars were shown by DR..
George E. Hale, director Of the
Mount Wilson Observatory. This
giant 1O0-inch Hooker telescope
will show in one hour as much as
the next largest in three.
With this famous instrument.
the Nicholson interferometer, DIR.
A. A Nicholson said he had meas
ured double stars so close to-
gether they looked as one, even in
the new telescope. Another phe-
nomenal advance by this instru-
ment is vastly to increase the ac-
curacy of measuring light.
DR.. Nicholson told the Academy
he will measure the speed of light
to one part in 100000. The limit
has been one in 10000.
Public Likes the Stars.
A public that likes the star.
wants to speculate on their mean
ing.
Scientists get a lot of fun, too.
from wise surmises about the bot.
tom of time. space and matter.
Nothing short of a sensation wa:
sprung at the National Academy
A new theory of time. space
matter. which scarcely four mer
in the country are said to under
stand. was revealed by DR.. Irving
Langmuir, of the General Electric
Company's research laboratory.
AS a daring attempt to bring t.
gether in one simple view at lea
five great scientific theories. J.
Langmuir's address amazed the
academy.
Some OF the members frankly
admitted they could not go so
deep"
His conclusions, they said, may
give a new conception of all ideas
of matter. motion and space
DR.. Langmuir asserted that space
and time have a structure similar
to that of matter. He reduces
everything to ''quantels."
Progress of Time.
But what is a quantel?
1t consists Of two parts, a positive
and a negative electron, he says,
and is present everywhere in space.
1t moves in all directions with the
speed of light.
In his view. quantels are the
"ether of space" and the cause of
all light. electricity. n everything.
One result, he held. is that light
does not radiate. as has been
thought, but Jumps in straight
lines from each atom.
Progress of time he considered
nothing but a series of Jumps by
the Quantels.