The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1934-05-16
TODAY S Science
BY DAVID DIETZ :

yUDt5E Franklin Institute of Philadelphia will award
/ Franklin medals to DR.. Henry Norris Russell
ord Or Irving Langmuir. The medals are among
the most coveted awards in the world of science
The two scientists chosen to receive TINS year
,-orJs ORC AMONG the most famous in the world
mr. Russeu sometimes called the dean of American
astronomers is director OF the princeton UNIVERSITY
observatory He has been honored many times Wy
his colleagues and has served as president OF the
American Association Of the Advancement oi 0ol-
ence. 49,.
DIR. Langmuir director of the research labora-
tories of the General Electric Company mas oeen Ve
recipient of the Nobel prize in chemistry
Dr. Russell has spent his life studying the distant
stars He has been chiefly interested in such SUB
iects as the composition and structure OF stars ther
life histories and methods of evolution.
Dr. Langmur has spent most of his time IN re-
cent wears in an industrial laboratory working upon
incandescent lamps and radio tubes
TT might seem at first glance that there was
i great gap between the work of Dr. Russell ana
Dr Iancmuir But actually. their fields of endeaVor
are much closer together than the average reaoer
might suspect For the foundation in both cases Is
knowledge of the atom
Both men have had to depend greatly in their
studies upon the use of the spectroScope DR. Rus
sell attaches his spectroscope to the end of tele-
SCOPE and uses it TO discover what atoms are dong
in star one hundred light years away. Dr. Lang
muir focuses his spectroScope upon some glowing
gas inside of a vacuum tube within arms reach
Dr. Langmuir was one of the pioneers in atomic
study number Of years ago. he and Dr. G. N
Lewis suggested the so-called Langmuir-Lews theory
Of the atom
According to this theory the outer electronS OF
an atom were scattered about in zones or shells Al
though this picture of the atom has been modified
by the work of Bohr Schrodnger. Dirac and others,
it is still regarded as fundamentally correct.
ONE Of the big problems which physicists are at
~ lacking today is the release of atomic energy.
Astronomers have reason to believe that such re-
lease of energy accounts for the radiation of the
stars Accordingly. any knowledge which can be &C
CURED about the composition, structure, or behavior
of star may have direct application to terrestrial
affairs some day.
The whole problem of stellar evolution is IN
state OF fux today because of difficulties with the
time scale of the universe II the theory Of an eX-
pandng universe is correct. the universe must be
much younger than previously thought.
A tentative suggestion made by Dr. Russell is
that there must be two sources of supply for the
energy Of a star. For want OF exact knowledge
at the time he refers TO these two supplies as giant
stun" and dwarf stuff" because the one supply Us
most characteristic of very large stars and the other
of very small ones.
As an example of the way in which a discovery
in astronomy may later find terrestrial there is
the familiar story of the discovery of helum. The
existence Of helium was first detected in the sun by
Sir Norman Lockyear a result of spectroscopic
study.