Evening star., 1935-02-03
TANK TO OPRODUCE
STRANGEST X-RAY
New Development, to Be
Used in Cancer Study,
Ready Soon.
BY the Associated Press.

BY the Associated Press.
NEW YORK, february "A seven
ton tank to generate huge volumes of
X-rays for a new experiment on
cancer was announced tonight by
Columbia University.
The tank, a substitute for conven-
tional X-ray tubes, will produce mil
hon-volt rays-enough to equal about
three pounds, or s6,0OO,oOO worth of
radium.
It will be used to explore sort of
no-man's land of X-rays, in which
the ordinary and fragile types Of ray
tubes have not yet done much work.
The new tank will be mostly stainless
steel, lead lined and durable as bat
tleShip.
Hospital Cooperating.
Announcement of the tank tube was
made in the annual report of DR.,
Francis Carter Wood, director of the
Crocker Institute of Cancer Research
at Columbia Cooperating is the
Presbyterian Hospital of Columbia
Medical Center, which has erected a
separate building to house the tank.
The cancer institute supplies the
tank, the hospital the building, and
after the institute finishes its ex-
ploration the hospital will use the
tank for cancer treatment.
This new kind of X-ray apparatus
was discovered by David H. Sloan OF
the University of California, where
a similar tank already has been built
The Columbia tank is the second, and
will be devoted only to cancer. The
building is already completed. The
tank will be ready in the Spring.
Treats Six Patients.
The tank is cylindrical, nearly
feet in height, a few inches more
in breadth and about AZ feet long
1t will hang from steel beams in the
center of a room 25 feet long and 1a
wide. Near its bottom are metal win
dows through which X-rays will pass
sufficient to treat six patients Simul-
taneously.
The entire interior of the tank is
a vacuum. In it the X-rays are pro-
duced by the energy from an electric
current of 100000 cycles second
The current fed into the machine
will be comparatively low, $4,000 volts
alternating.
A high-frequency generator inside
the vacuum tank steps up this cur
rent into the energies needed to pro-
duce X-rays of anything from 500,-
600 up to 100000 volts.
DR.. Woods report states that X-rays
up to $4,000 volts have been found
to possess no more lethal power or
cancer and other living tissues than
lower voltages. The high-power rays
tested only penetrate deeper.
Large Area Unstudied.
There remains uninveStigated, "
the Wood report says, the voltage re-
gion lying between $4,000 and l.
000, 900.
Theoretically the chief advantage
Of the higher voltage is the possibil-
ity of obtaining greater depth dose.
That there will be any
greater destructive effect on the cells
of the tumor is very doubtful.
1T is also important to find out
what may be called the most COM
mercially efficient voltage. The
higher the voltage the more expensive
the apparatus-a point is rapidly
reached where the patient cannot af-
ford to pay for the cost of the treat
ment.
1T may be found that at lower and
less expensive voltages the results are
just as good as those at 100000 or
100000 X-ray volts, or with radium.
If so, electrical engineers can devote
their energies to designing the SIM
plest possible type of apparatus-at
lowered production cost"