Evening star., 1941-01-25
Of Stars, Men
And Atoms
Notebook of Science Progress
In Laboratory, Field
And Study
BIZ Thomas r. Henry.

Growing OLD may pe proCcoo VI se'-
ting stuck in the mud and finally being
smothered to death.
This tentative explanation OF the
chemical process is advanced by DR.. A.
Baird Hastings, Harvard blochemlst,
member of the Advisory Committee on
the Problems of Old Age of the National
Institute of Health
The countless billions of cells which
make up any animal are bathed con-
stantly in intercellular fluid, he ex-
planned. Minute analysis of tissue from
living rats, he said, shows that when
the animals reach an age corresponding
to about the sixth decade of life in hu-
man beings there is notable thickening
of this intercellular fluid, and at the
same time the actual cells seem to
shrink in size 1t appears as II various
debris of the body, such as fat particles,
gathered in the fluid bath.
The cells might be considered as in
dividual animals, although bound to-
gether in a close organization, still living
in the watery environment in which life
started more than q billion years ago.
AS the mud" gets thicker they have
more and more difficulty in breathing.
Experiments, DR.. Hastings said, still
are in their preliminary stages and an
enormous amount of work must be done
before the hypothesis can be proved or
disproved. The chemical composition Of
the intercellular fluid is known only
quite generally and essentially nothing
is known about changes in its makeup
with passing years. One of the prob
lens on which the chemists are con-
centrating is that of determining whether
progressive changes can be found in the
amounts of inorganic minerals, such as
calcium and magnesium, inside the cells
and in the fluid. If such changes could
be demonstrated 1t would indicate that
these got out of the cells themselves,
where they belong. as age progressed and
helped muddy the water still more
Failure to find fundamental chemical
changes with age in the past, DR.. Hast
ings said, may have been due to the
fact that most experiments have been
made on tissue taken from animals after
death when all the active chemical
processes have stopped. He and his CO.
workers are using only living tissue.
The mud-forming process, if the hypo-
thesis can be sustained by further
analyses. presumably would proceed
faster in some animals than others and
also there would be differences between
individuals, which might explain why
some persons grow old so rapidly. The
amount Of debris in the intercellular
fluid would be criterion of an indi-
viduals actual age
A collection of about fifty 100000 O00-
year-old pearls now is being studied at
the United States National Museum
They were secreted in the bodies of
the Inoceramus, large mollusks related
to the oyster. which were abundant
in the upper Cretaceous period of
geological history, while the giant dino
saurs were coming to the end of their
days.
Once they may have been lustrous
gems. The millenniums in the depths
of the earth have robbed them of their
luster. They now are dull yellowish
gray to dark gray in color and only an
expert would recognize them as pearls.
They were collected from Cretaceous de-
posits in Western Kansas and were sent
to the National Museum by George F.
Sternberg of the Fort Hays Kansas
State College. A report on them has
just been made to the Washington Acad-
emy of Sciences by Roland w. Brown,
paleontologist of the United States
Geological Survey.
Fossil pearls. DR.. Brown says. appear
to be extremely rare. Only about so
finds ever have been reported, although
presumably the process of natural pearl
formation has been active almost from
the time the oyster genus appeared on
earth. Many, he believes, have been
mistaken for pebbles, fish teeth. algal
nodules and seeds or fruits of plants.
The present collection contains many
flne specimens for the purposes of SCI
ence, although they would hardly appeal
to gem enthusiast.
How mollusk makes pearls. DR..
Brown points out in his report, still is
not entirely clear, and to proceed with
any theorizing on the origin of the pres
ent specimens it is necessary to under
stand clearly the nature of the gems.
They consist of a nucleus surrounded
by number of concentric layers of a
mineral known as nacre, or aragonite. a
calcium carbon oxygen compound. These
layers are separated by layers of an or
ganic substance, conchiolin, which is
formed OF calcium, hydrogen nitrogen
and oxygen. The ordinary form is spher-
ical, although the pearl can take on
many shapes, depending on where it Is
formed in the body of the mollusk.
1t IS formed in a sack within the epi-
thelium the portion of the mollusk which
also secretes the substances making up
the shell of the animal Before this
pearl secretion starts 1t is essential to
have center of irritation within this
epithelium. During most of the life of
the creature it is protected by a thick
shell which prevents external substances
from getting into it.
Nevertheless, grain of sand may
sometimes get under the shell and be-
come imbedded in the layer of secreting
cells. This has long been recognized in
the Orient. In China there is an age
old practice of introducing foreign OBJ
jects, such as tiny statues of Buddha,
into the epithelium to promote the
growth of pearls.