Evening star., 1939-12-30

TIou IIIIlI9CII JED VII
World Epidemics,
Scientists Told
Outbreaks Not Caused
By Changes in Germs,
Typhoid Tests Show
By the Associated Press.
COLUMBUS. Ohio, Dec. 3O.-Man
himself generates the dynamite cap
which sets off death-dealing epi-
denies such as the flu outbreak of
1918, two Iowa State College scien-
fists announced today at the closing
session of the American Association
for the Advancement of Science.
Sudden explosive outbreaks of dis
ease are not caused by mutations
the sudden changes in the disease
germs themselves-but by altera-
tions of the person harboring the
disease, they reported.
DR.. John w. Gowen and DR.. M. R.
Zelle of Ames, Iowa, explained they
had been able to develop disease re-
sistance or susceptibility in expert
mental animals for Is generations.
In some cases, however, the
typhoid germs suddenly f1ared into
activity in the resistant mice with
out causing an epidemic in the ones
most susceptible to the disease.
The origin of epidemics has been
assumed to be a mutation of HARM
less or inactive disease germs to
form a highly virulent strain.
The results indicate, however, that
a chemical change in one person or
a group of persons who harbor the
germs is sufficient to transform the
bacteria into an epidemic-causing
group of organisms.
New World of Unseen Rays.
A radio microscope, new scien-
tific instrument which has revealed
an entire world of unseen rays, was
announced by I. I. Rabi, P. Kusch
and S. Millman of Columbia Uni
versity.
Man himself, as well as all kinds
of supposedly inert matter, con-
stantly emit the rays that this in
strument "sees."
The radio device actually is ra-
dio frequency spectroscope. It does
the same thing for cool, non glowing
matter that the spectroscope does
when it reveals the kinds of atoms
that make the stars.
The discovery probably reveals to
man the last hitherto unseen or
undetected rays in nature. The ex-
istence of such rays coming from
man and all living things, and prob
ably from the inanimate world, has
been suspected by scientists for
many years.
The amateur photographer can
now shoot his pictures against the
light and expect his low-priced lens
to take indoor pictures in dim light
like a fast" lens by using new
coating material, metallic fluoride.
This coating, instead of dimming
the light, raises the transmission
about 10 per cent for each element
In the lens of the camera.
The result is to double the speed
of lenses in present multiple lens
cameras, and to greatly increase the
speed in cheaper cameras, DR.. G.
Hawley Cartwright Of the Massa-
chusetts Institute of Technology an
nounced. The lens coatings are one
of the first practical developments
of the invisible glass discovery an
nounced a year ago by Massachu-
setts Tech and the General Electric
Co.
DR.. Julian S. Huxley told the
scientists warning nations of the
world are today in about the evolu-
tionary stage of the almost brainless
dinosaurs which vanished from the
earth millions of years ago.
The English scientist appealed to
countries like the United States"
which are technically equipped and
are not involved in the present war,
to begin building up planning or
ganizations on large enough scale
to function as a social brain" in
order that civilization proceed nor
mally after the war and not END IN
chaos.
Hormones for Fish.
A new way to increase the Ma
tion's fish food resources by giving
hormones to fish was reported by
Arthur D. Hasler, Roland K. Meyer
and Howard M. Field of the Univer-
sity of Wisconsin. The hormones
speed up spawning by several weeks
and even make some fish spawn
which otherwise would not.
The hormone was discovered IN
the pituitary glands of the brains
of carp. This brain extract was in
jected into female muskellunges,
which refused to spawn because
dams in rivers had cut them of
from return to their natural spawn
ing grounds.
The "muskies" spawned, in cap"
tivity, in three days after getting
the carp shots from hypodermic.
The same shots were tried on trout
and induced spawning six to seven
weeks earlier than normal.
DR.. Albert F. Blakeslee, geneticist,
of Cold Springs Harbor, N. Y, was
named president-elect of the asso-
ciation. DR.. Blakeslee has been re-
search associate of the Carnegie In
stitution of Washington at the New
York laboratory for many years.
His major contribution to science
in recent years was the discovery
that colchicine, a chemical closely
related to sex hormones, could cause
the doubling of chromosomes In
plants and produce an entirely new
species.
DR.. Blakeslee, who succeeds Dr.
Walter B. Cannon of Harvard Uni