Evening star., 1952-09-04
By Thomas R. Henry
The Stor's Science Editor

"the pure stuff"
There was the major object Of
the launching yesterday Of the
worlds largest existing balloon
which, it was hoped, would cruise
for "a hours in the extreme
upper reaches Of the atmosphere
approximately Is miles above the
earth's surface.
In this almost airless region.
they expect to find hard, weighable
matter created out of energy.
The balloon was expected to
serve as temporary plat
form in space at the re-
ceiving end of the cyclotron Of
the universe where particles which,
have been whirled around for mil
lions Of years in the magnetic fields
of the whirling galaxies come to
the end of their Journeys through
Infinite space and time.
The scientists hopes were
dashed when holes developed in
the fragile plastic of the balloon
and the load of instruments had
to be taken off before the balloon
was launched at New Brighton,
MINI. Another attempt with al
new balloon is planned in a few
months.
What happens will throw new
light on how matter "iS made out
of nothing" 1t may make pos
sible a better Interpretation Of the
structure of the univerSe-even of
the little Milky Way universe ia
miliar to man with it's puny few
hundred billion stars and stellar
systems. Chiefly, the new light
may be on the great universe of
millions of milky way systems outI
Iof which the particles with ener-
IgieS of millions of billions of volts
are believed to come.
Instruments Included.
On the balloon were mounted
instruments to detect these par
ticles and what happens to them.
The 3 million cubic-foot sphere
Iof helium inclosed in a silvery
plastic envelope a hundredth of
an inch thick was expected to re-
main for as long as "a hours I'M
a region previously known only
from quick stabs of rockets.
This upper four-tenths of one
per cent of the earth's atmosphere
above the 25-mile altitude is an
extremely critical frontier of re-
search. Within it is taking place
a strange phenomenon-the crea-
ton of actual matter out of
energy.
Even ten years ago this would
have been considered the widest
sort of fantasy. It now is a we'll
established fact.
1t all goes back to the most
fateful mathematical equation in
history-Einstein's law OF the
equivalence of mass and energy.
This states that mass and energy
are interchangeable and that
mass. in grams, times the velocity
OF light in centimeters per Sec
ond, equals energy, in ergs.
Staggering Figures.
The figures, Of course, are Su-
per-aStronomical. If one gram of
matter would be transformed en-
tirely into energy it would amount
to about so quintillion ergs. Since
the earliest ventures in atom
fiSSion the Transformation of mass
into energy is we'll established.
The atomic explosion depends on
the transformation of certain
minute amount of the weight of
the atom into energy. Quite re-
Gently the opposite has been dem
onstrated. 1t puts much greater
tax on the imagination.
But it can be demonstrated that
it takes place in even such feeble
atom smashing machines as man
has been able to build. where the
utmost energies hoped for are a
few billion electron volts. One of
the elementary particles Of mat
ter-a proton, neutron or a deu-
teron-moving at energies within
the billions of volts range-strikes
and smashes some sort. of atom.
The atom is smashed and part of
the enormous energy which has