Great Falls tribune. [volume] (Great Falls, Mont.) 1921-current, 1921-02-14
RAD|UM RIVAL
|NCANCERCURE
IS NEW X RAY
Discovery at Harvard
Eliminates Expense of
Using Rare Metal.
Life Insurance Concerns
Give $4,000 to Aid
Laboratory Tests.

Cambridge, Mass, Feb. 13.-{By the
Associated Press. .)-Discoveries made
by William Duane, professor Of bio
physics at Harvard, working in collab-
Grafton with research students of phys
les. have made it possible, according
Of more penetrating quality than have
ever before been obtained in this coun-
try, and these new rays are now to be
used for the first time in America for
the alienation of cancer.
While it is emphatically stated by
Professor Duane that neither X-rays
nor radium should be considered per-
manent cure of all kinds of cancer, it
has long been known that radium has a
marked alternative effect upon this
disease, and the Harvard physicists
have reason to believe that the effects
of the new highly penetrating X-rays
will be equally beneficial.
Insurance Companies Aid.
The Harvard cancer commission is
erecting a new building in Boston
where an X-ray plant will be installed
as well as the commissions radium
plant Confident that the life Of cancer
patients may thus be prolonged, life
insurance companies OF Boston have
given over $4,000 toward the new
building. Here the experiments win be
performed. which will test the value of
the newly discovered type Of X-rays.
How effective they will prove cannot
be determined until they have been
used for some time.
Professor Duane was graduated from
the University of Pennsylvania in 1892
and from Harvard in 1898. He took
his Doctors degree in Berlin in 1893,
worked for many years in the Curie
radium laboratory at Paris, and came
to Harvard In 1918 as assistant pro-
fessor of physics and research fellow
Of the cancer commission. In 1917 he
was promoted to new full professor
ship Of bio-physics.
Advantage of x-rays.
The significance of the discovery was
explained in the following statement
for the press at Harvard Sunday:
"An advantage Of X-rays over ra-
dunn Is that the latter is scarce and
expensive, costing at pres
ent over 100000 gram, and can
therefore only be used in small guam
titles. If X-rays were used it would
be possible to make the rays enormous
~ more powerful than has been pos
sible with the limited amount Of radium
available. The trouble with the use Of
Xrays up to this time has been that
they are not as penetrating as the So
called Gamma rays Of radium and the
been to secure this needed quality.
1T was known that to secure pene-
tration it was necessary to secure
high frequency Of vibration. The
physicists, after great num-
Der Of experiments at length found
physical law known as the 'Quantum
law. applied to the X-ray spectrum,
and discovered they could increase the
frequency of the rays and thus their
penetration, by increasing the voltage
Of current used in the X-ray tube"
Strong as Radum.
professor Duane reports that the
tube goes to pieces under voltage Of
more than 10000 volts, but that a |
sufficiently high voltage has been Sc
cured to make the X-rays very nearly
as effective for certain medical pur-
poses as the Gamma rays Of radium.
'The Germans, it is said. have made
great headway recently with the use
Of high frequency Of X-rays in allevi-
ating cancer, but these particular rays
have not been used in America up to
this time.
"a vast amount Of work has recently
been done by Professor Duane in the
detailed study Of X-ray spectra. Some
If this work may prove effective in
the medical value Of X-rays,
out much Of it is being done simply |
With the scientific purpose of getting |
70 know more about the mysterious
.ays and the laws which govern them" |