Evening star., 1929-06-27
CREATION CURVES
BACK TO ITSELF,
SCIENTISTS REVEAL
Huge Lenses Pick Up Evil
dence From NebuIae 80 Sep
tiIlion Miles Away.
NO-BOUNDARY EARTH
Is TRIVIAL EXAMPLE
DR.. Francis G.. Pease and Milton
Humason Make Observations
at Mount Wilson.
BY THOMAS R. HENRY.

VIZ SdHItCSlC
have looked into space further than
man has looked before-approximately
80 ,oOo, 600, ,Ooo, 200, 900, ,oOo. 100000 miles.
They could not look this distance
with their own eyes even with the aid
of the most powerful of telescopes-but
they looked with the enormously more
delicate artificial eye of the spectro-
scope
AS a result of what they observed in
these far realms Of space they have
presented concrete evidence that all
creation curves back on itself, just as
does the surface Of the earth, but in an
enormously more complicated fashion.
These observations came from DR..
Francis G. Pease and Milton Humason,
working with the 100-inch telescope at
the Mount Wilson Observatory.
The observations we're announced by
the institution yesterday with an inter-
probation by DR.. Edwin p. Hubble, the
discoverer Of the nature of the spiral
nebulae as island universes." The
nebulae are the most distant objects
in space from the human observer.
Pease and Humason observed that the
farther away they were the faster they
seemed to be moving, attaining veloci-
ties indicated on the astronomical in
struments of from 3,100 to 1900 miles
per second.
Appearance Of Velocity.
But, says DR.. Hubble, this Is only an
apparent velocity depending on the
position of the observer, and when the
proper formulae are applied to 1t con-
crete evidence is obtained of the actual
nature Of space itself, beyond which is
nothing.
since the surface Of the earth has
definite area but no boundaries" says
DR.. Hubble, ''it must necessarily be
curved. This is a trivial example, but
it offers a simple analogy. If the uni
verse has finite volume but no bound
aries, as indicated by the theory of
relativity, then space itself must be
curved. The universe is so large, how
ever, that curvature in relatively
small volume may be inappreciable. An
investigation of the matter demands
observations over as large a volume as
possible. This is what Mr.. Humason
is attempting in his study of nebulae
with the 100-inch reflector. The tele-
scope is the largest in existence. Nebu-
lac are the largest and brightest objects
in the sky, hence they can be observed
at the greatest distances.
THE method employed Is to analyze
the light of nubulae with q spectre
graph and to study the photographs of
the spectra thus obtained. Even the
brightest Of the nebulae require long
exposures with the spectrograph and
for the faintest that can be studied
the exposures may run into weeks.
Spectra OF some 40 Of the brighter and
hence nearer nebulae had previously
been accumulated, largely through the
efforts Of DR.. Slipher of the Lowell
Observatory. The various lines Of these
spectra were almost invariably shifted
to the red of the normal positions, and
these shifts were interpreted as veloci-
ties In the line of sight, away from the
earth. Such shifts, either toward the
red or toward the blue, are constantly
being observed and studied in the
spectra OF stars where they are known
TO be caused by motion in the line of
sight. Among the nebulae. however.
the shifts were almost invariably
toward the red and the corresponding
velocities OF recession averaged many
times those found for the stars. The
greatest velocity found was about 1,10O
miles per second.
Distance and Speed.
Recently, after the distances Of MANY
nebulae had been determined, 1t was
discovered that these velocities of re-
ceSSion were correlated with the dis
tances. The farther away q nebula is
the faster 1t seems to be travelling,
always from the observer. The few
velocities Of approach were very small
and were restricted to the nearest
nebulae.
THE reliable data were restricted to
nebulae not more than 100000 light
years from the earth approximately
4,000, ,000, ,0O0, ,000, 900, ,0O0, 900 miIes), and
that for every million light years of
distance approximately 500 900, ,0OO,-
000, ,000, ,000, 900 miles) there was shift
TO the red in the spectra OF nearly 100
miles per second. The outstanding
velocity Of 1,100 miles per second be-
longs to a nebula whose distance Is not
definitely known except by the shift in
the spectrum.
"Mr. Humason's investigations furnish
tests Of this correlation among much
more distinct objects. He concentrated
on clusters of nebulae-huge organiza-
tions averaging more than a million
light years in diameter and each con-
tanning several hundred individual
nebulae. This procedure offers two
advantages: The distances of clusters
are determined far more accurately than
distances Of individual nebulae. and
among the many objects of different
luminosities in a given cluster he could
select the very brightest ones to investi-
gate. !.
"The first definite results, reported
q few months ago, gave a red shift in
the spectra of N G c 1919, the bright
est nebula In a cluster in the constella-
tion of Pegasus corresponding to We
locity Of 2,400 miles per second away
from the earth. The cluster appears to
be at distance of 25,000,000 light
years (about $4,000, ,000, 900 900 ,000, ,000,-
100000 miles). hence the relation be-
that found among the nearer nebulae.
Coma Berenices Nebulae.
"The new results concern three nebu-
lac in smaller cluster in the constel-
lation of Coma Berenices about four
degrees from the pole of the Milky Way.
The distance of the cluster Is OF the
order of 50,00O,000 light years or twice
that Of the cluster In Pegasus.
Although the nebulae are among the
brightest In the cluster they appear so
faint that the exposures ran up as high
as 40 hours. A study Of the spectra by
Humason indicated red shifts corre-
spending to veiocities away from the
N G @ 1880. 4,6O0 miles for N q G
4853 and 3l00 miles for N q G 4B65.
st Is reasonable To assume that the
two former are bright nebulae belong
ing to the cluster and that the third,
N @ @ 4865, Is g fainter nebula much
nearer the earth. On this assumption
the mean OF the two larger velocities,