Evening star., 1949-03-21
Stars, Men and Atoms
Great Improvements
In Plane Cannon Seen
Rockets and Non.Recoil Weapons
Planned for Jet Aircraft
By Thomas r. Henry

BY Thomas n. Henry
Airmen in another war would be
equipped with greatly improved arms.
These well may play as important part
as some of the sensationally fantastic new
weapons now predicted.
Lines of research being followed under
contracts with the Army's ordnance de-
partment are revealed in a report Of the
Armour Research Foundation, although de-
tails of results necessarily are secret. ma
jor activity has been the improvement Of
small caliber cannon for aircraft which
will be lighter and take up less space. A
special phase of the program, it is an
nounced, permits the development of ra-
ideally new and different weapon principles
in anticipation of the future requirements
of aerial combat
A long-term program is being sponsored
by the Office of the Chief of Ordnance for
the development of heavy caliber aircraft
cannon which will be suitable for installa-
ton in jet planes. Several methods are be-
ing pursued including rocket principles and
the designing of guns without recoil when
fired.
The problem is especially difficult, the re-
port points out, because every step in the
development of the gun must be taken with
due consideration of the structure of the
jet plane.
For the Signal Corps new type of photo
electric cell is being developed with high
sensitivity to extremely short heat radiation,
or "black light" whose use in such imple-
ments as spy detectors was one of the ma
jor developments of the last war.
In still another Signal Corps project an
extremely light but strong wire is being de-
veloped of an alloy of the metals cobalt.
beryllium, silver and copper for use in field
telephone Set-upS which promises greatly to
reduce the burden of the cumbersome wire
stringing which has been necessary up to
now.
Work in all these lines is justified regard
less of possible military uses in the future,
the foundation report stresses because all
the developments will have incidental ap-
plications in industry.
The gene, infinitesimally minute granule
of heredity, probably has been seen for the
first time.
This is the latest accomplishment with the
electron microscope, which has opened up
a whole new world of the infinitesimally
little. reported to the American Association
for the Advancement of Science by Drs.
Daniel c. Pease and Richard F. Baker of the
University of Southern California.
The microscope already has shown the
shape and something of the behavior, Of
the smallest forms of life-the filterable
viruses responsible for some of the deadliest
human and animal diseases. The gene, per-
haps the ultimate unit of life itself, rep
resents much further step.
Genes long have been known to exist.
They are necessary for present theories of
heredity. They. are contained in bundles
known as chromosomes which are passed
on from parents to offspring. These
bundles are microscopically visible but the
particles which they contain are far below
the limits of any optical microscope.
AS revealed in the electron microscope
they range in diameter from 100 to loco
ten millionths of centimeter. They are
shaped like leaves, balls and cigars. Those
of similar shape are grouped together in
the chromosomes.
The fact that the objects seen by the two
California scientists are actually genes is not
clearly established. They are, however. dis
crete particles contained in chromosomes
where the hypothetical units of heredity.
and nothing else. would be expected. They
are comparable in size to the lower range
of virus particles, as has been predicted.
The work was done with giant chromo-
somes from fruit flies which are easy to OBJ
serve and which have yielded some of the
most important discoveries to date on the
actual mechanisms of heredity.