We face a new tomorrow in the utilization of hitherto unharnessed forces of nature. The Athenians of old built a civilization, through the labor of some 15,000 slaves, which stimulated the vision and daring of man in dramatic art, sculpture, and a new way of life that enriched the entire world for 2,000 years. Today the giant electricity, with power the equivalent of many millions of slaves, has built an industrial era that challenges the vision of man almost beyond human imagination. Yet power—in the shadow of a new tomorrow that is now upon us—will be so vast and so completely beyond man’s accomplishments of today as to place at his command energies that will make him almost a god in hitherto unaccomplished endeavor. The upper stratosphere, the moon, and even the near-by planets maybe within man’s grasp of visitation and conquest. Let us hope the conquest will not be for destructive purposes, but rather to forward a common aim to push human happiness to higher levels of attainment for all men.
The cracking of uranium 235 by the great Cyclotron in the Radiation Laboratory on the Berkeley campus of the University of California is indeed food for thought in the matter of power as one contemplates the future and the opportunity for tapping huge storehouses of energy never before so seemingly accessible for man’s utilization. It is said that 5 pounds of uranium 235, once started in its fission or splitting in half caused by bombardment from powerful radio-active processes, will continue this bombardment through its own inner atomic bombardment processes thus released, splitting in half until all of its vast energies are dissipated. Indeed, 5 pounds of uranium 235 thus started in its processes of disintegration, it is said, could release sufficient energy to drive the great battleship North Carolina, one of the largest battleships afloat, from New York to London and back again. Such a feat in ordinary navigation probably requires more than 6,500 tons of oil.
To acquire a quick grasp of man’s rapid conquest of power in recent years, as compared with his slow progress in the thousands of years previous, let us for the moment review the century just past. In 1830, Michael Faraday in England and Joseph Henry in America, by passing a small loop of wire in front of an electromagnet, demonstrated that an electric current, or what is now better described as the flow of electrons, was caused to take place within the wire composing the loop, thus energizing the loop in such a way that an electric “kick” or desire to rotate was brought about if placed within the field of force of a second magnet. In 1870, forty years later, the Encyclopedia Britannica was only then able to say of the dynamo: “An interesting but useless toy.” And yet, in the following 70 years what a vast industrial revolution has taken place due to this apparently useless toy! Today we face a far greater miracle of miracles. With this new atomic energy in the offing under man’s control, no longer shall we find it necessary to build giant wharves and trucks and cranes, where load after load of fuel is brought to feed the great ocean-going vessels or ships of the air. Some day these fuel arrangements may no longer be needed. Instead of pampering the appetite of our engine with delicacies like coal or oil, we may be able to induce it to work on a plain diet of atomic energy. If that day ever arrives, barges and trucks and cranes will disappear and a journey from San Francisco to Berlin, from the earth to the moon, yes, even from the earth to Mars will be brought about by a supply of fuel carried in a small compartment containing a modest weight of uranium 235 or other similar stored material that is handy.
Before further discussion of the possibilities that man may harness successfully this huge atomic energy, let us see whether there is any evidence available that would indicate nature has discovered already the key to its utilization. To the engineer, all this speculation concerning the harnessing of atomic energy is but a mere impractical dream, to the physicist it is a philosophical urge for further exploration in the atomic structure of the nuclei themselves, while to the astronomer constructive thought concerning the vast atomic energy of the universe is the moving force that gives birth to new theories concerning the structure and evolution of the universe. The best illustration of the utilization of atomic energy is the sun. Einstein has long since shown that there is an equivalent of mass and energy so that one gram of mass represents a definite energy value. We know by measurement the amount of energy which the sun squanders each year by radiating light into space. At the present rate of consumption, the sun’s stock will, according to Sir Arthur Eddington, noted astronomer, last just fifteen billion years. On the other hand, he states that by surveying the various kinds of energy in turn, with which we are now familiar, we soon convince ourselves that the ordinary kinds would be used up in twenty million years or so, and that no one now believes that the sun (and consequently the earth) are as young as that would imply. Thus, by passing from the ordinary known source of energy to atomic energy, we vastly extend the possible life of the sun and come to the conclusion that nature has the key to atomic energy utilization. The temperature of the sun’s surface is about 6,000° C., while the temperature at its center is calculated to be about forty million degrees. This enormous temperature in the interior is essential in order to keep the gaseous matter of which the sun is composed to its actual observed volume against the force of gravity, which tends to compress it, and if this temperature dropped, the sun would shrink in volume. Hence, to keep this vast flow of energy from within to the outward part of the sun, there unquestionably comes the conclusion that the sun contains within itself the fuel that has to last for the whole of its life. Seeing that nature has supplied the method of releasing this gigantic atomic energy by huge temperatures such as forty million degrees and corresponding huge pressures, can man find a key to the cupboard here on this terrestrial sphere?
To answer this query, let us first tarry for a moment to consider some interesting internal atomic nuclear experiments on a colossal scale that enable man to peer into this cupboard. At the University of California at Berkeley, Dr. E. O. Lawrence, world-famous inventor of the Cyclotron, which two years ago won for him the Nobel Prize, is ferreting out new knowledge concerned with subatomic laws of action and reaction. Under his magic touch, positively charged atomic nuclei are placed in a strong magnetic field created by the world’s largest electromagnet. These positively charged nuclei are then driven forward by rhythmic impulses, so timed that each succeeding impulse adds to the previous one, thus causing the atomic nuclei to spin with ever increasing speed. Not content with the modem automobile speed of 100 miles an hour down the open highway, that flaming youth finds so exhilarating, Dr. Lawrence makes these atomic nuclei move forward with a speed of 10,000 miles per second!
With such vast speeds attained, the highly motorized atomic nuclei are discharged into a chamber containing the chemical body he wishes to bombard. Only about one out of a million of the emerging particles collides with the structure interspersed in its pathway, so porous is the physical universe we deal with in subatomic structure. However, under this terrific collision of even one particle out of a million, the structure of the atom so bombarded is dislodged and a new order set up. The theory of subatomic structure at present in vogue tells us that all creation is composed of but two substances—positive and negative electricity, known as protons and electrons, or combinations of the two, known as neutrons. Perhaps the present theory of the composition of atoms can’t be simplified quite as much as I have just mentioned without quite a bit of inaccuracy. However, the description as given has been used quite a bit in the past, and, if I call it “a” theory rather than “the” theory at present in vogue, I think it would be sufficiently correct. The idea of an electron spinning around an atom is only used as a means of description, as this motion has never been observed and probably does not exist. The simplest atomic structure we know of is the hydrogen atom, which contains one proton or unit of positive electricity with one electron or unit of negative electricity spinning around it at sufficient speed to keep it from falling into the central nucleus and thus destroying itself by neutralizing its charge with the proton.
The atom is very minute in size. What do we mean when we say an atom is very small? Well, it may be said that a gram of hydrogen, for instance, contains 600,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 atoms, and that if you place a row of them side by side, it would take about two million to cover a distance equal to the width of the dot over the letter i in this article. Now, since the hydrogen atom consists of a positive unit of electricity called a proton and a negative unit called an electron, how large is an electron? Since an electron is 1/1846 the mass of a hydrogen atom, it is a very small mass indeed, so small in fact that 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 electrons are necessary to pass every second through an ordinary 20-watt tungsten lamp in your library to keep it in full running condition. In atomic bombardments, either neutrons or protons or both may be captured or expelled. It is necessary to vary the number of protons or neutrons in the atom to convert one substance into another. The number of electrons can be temporarily varied, but this does not produce a new element or isotope. This readjustment is usually accomplished by either adding subatomic energy or subtracting therefrom. At the moment, perhaps more research activity is under way on nuclear structure of the atom than has ever taken place in specific re search in the history of the world. By such gigantic bombardment Dr. Lawrence has been able to transmute over 60 fundamental substances thought to be impossible of accomplishment in the good old research days of the alchemist, such as gold, silver, lead, aluminum, platinum, and the like, of which the earth’s surface is supposed to contain some 92. In this rearrangement of subatomic structure, energy in colossal quantities is either absorbed or given off. It is the giving off of energy that is particularly of interest in this article. This rearrangement in subatomic structure within the atom itself, brought about through release or absorption of huge energies, serves to illustrate how nature here on this planet makes use of subatomic energies.
Already significant values for the human race have been achieved through the operation of this new working tool. Many are prone to believe that the Cyclotron may rival the telescope and the microscope in service to man. Before we discuss further the external use of this vast power which we hope man will be the master of in the new tomorrow so soon to be upon us, let us see some modem miracles that internal applications of these subatomic energies harnessed for man’s uses are even now bringing about. The placing of common table salt, for instance, in the pathway of these escaping subatomic particles, moving at vast speeds alluded to above, has caused the formation of a new radioactive substance never before known to man. Unlike radium, which costs something like a million dollars an ounce and takes some 1,700 years to disintegrate to half its original value, this new radioactive substance is cheaply manufactured, has all the fine qualities of radium insofar as healing cancerous tissue is concerned, and yet it exists only for a few short hours. The beam of so- called alpha particles which can be produced in the new Cyclotron now in operation at Berkeley, California, is equivalent to more than 700 grams of radium, a quantity which, could it be obtained, would cost tens of millions of dollars. Hence, as a new medical weapon the Cyclotron and its host of new creations in the subatomic energy-releasing world that is being brought to life seem to have untold value for the future.
Another matter of outstanding interest to science is the fact that having treated common table salt, for instance, with the bombardment of the subatomic particles from the Cyclotron, the table salt itself may then be taken into the body through the mouth. By means of a Geiger Counter, which is a delicate instrument so geared as to detect even the minutest radioactive emanations, the journey of the radioactive salt may be traced through the entire human body. Thus the human circulatory system may be explored as never before. Even trees and plant life at the University of California Agricultural Experiment Station at Davis are feeling helpful new research activities. Through injections of radioactive salts into the circulatory system of a plant, hitherto undiscovered laws of tree and plant life are being ascertained. In the treatment of leukemia subatomic energies from radioactive phosphorus are directed into the blood stream. Thus, badly cancerous and diseased blood corpuscles are affected so as to ease the patient and in some instances prolong his life. It is hoped that a treatment is in the offing that may prove effective in healing this dread disease through the use of these subatomic energy releases.
And so we ask ourselves “what of this new power” just over the shadow line at the moment, insofar as its further uses to mankind are concerned. If nature can utilize this power in maintaining the heat of the sun and in bringing about the tremendous internal changes within the atom itself as illustrated above, can man further harness this power for external applications? Some have suggested the utilization of the heat energy given off in this rearrangement of the subatomic structure by causing the heating of tubes through which water or other liquid is conveyed in much the same way that Italy has utilized heat from certain of her volcanoes in developing power in a steam turbine of 10,000-kilowatt capacity. Others think that the radio-active particle itself, as it leaves the dislodged subatomic structure, can be controlled by magnetic forces as Dr. Lawrence does in his Cyclotron. For example, if these dislodged radioactive particles emanating from a fixed body could be made to encounter a magnetic force of parabolic design, the dislodged radioactive particles might be made to travel in parallel lines and thus bring about a reactive force against the fixed body causing it to move in the opposite direction on the principle of reaction in the rocket.
The airplane has in this decade undergone gigantic development. Achievements in plane speed thought impossible of attainment have been realized. But even so, the speed thus far attained is but a mere child’s imagination compared to the speed possible under this new power. The rocket, that mechanical device which alone can move forward in the vacuum or in interplanetary space, seems to be one step nearer perfection due to this approaching source of power. One of Newton’s three laws of motion states that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. Not many years ago a college professor in one of our far western frontier universities was hammering home these three laws of motion to his class, and by way of driving home this law of action and reaction he put this problem up to his class: “Suppose I am upon an absolutely frictionless table situated in a room devoid of air—in other words situated in a perfect vacuum, how would I get off the table?” Said a rough and ready woodsman student who was surreptitiously chewing tobacco, “Why professor, I’d take a big chew of tobacco and then let her go ‘whew’ and the reaction would carry me off the table in the opposite direction.” He was right, because he had solved the problem of the rocket.
Of course, before travel in stellar space becomes possible—indeed before we may even peer out into space and contemplate its conquest, we must first acquire a planetary instead of a provincial outlook—the whole earth must mentally be our home. To escape from the earth we must overcome gravitational pull; we must pierce the stratosphere or air blanket of 250 miles in height. To visit the moon requires a journey of 240,000 miles across void—a distance of nine times the circumference of the earth, while to reach Mars or Venus a gulf of 30,000,000 to 50,000,000 miles must be traversed. And to be free from the earth’s gravitational pull a velocity of approximately 7 miles per second must be attained, or a velocity 50 times that of the fastest airplane of this day and age. To accomplish such a speed without loss of human life, the start from earth must be slow and speed acquired gradually to reach full speed of 7 miles per second when the rocket emerges into airless space. The rocket must be capable of guidance and maneuvering in planetary space and since humans are to guide it, provision for adequate supplies of food, air, and water, and for maintenance of comfortable temperatures must be made. These are all matters to be solved before the dim mist is removed that prevents the rocket from utilizing the vast atomic energies that may be unlocked, but Dr. Robert Hutchings Goddard has done much at least in solving some of the problems of the rocket in its operation close to earth. Hence, if these small particles or emanations constituting vast subatomic energies found in disintegrating uranium 235, for instance, could in some way be directed, instead of emanating in all directions as they do at present, then the action and reaction principle could be brought to bear to move the rocket forward and the energy thus utilized on a vast scale for propulsion of the rocket. The steam turbine deriving its steam from water evaporated by energies emanating from heat ejection of subatomic bombardments and the rocket receiving its directive energies by electromagnetic control of emanating rays of charged particles from materials made radioactive are but two suggestions for unlocking the possibilities of the “may be—may be” land of tomorrow. Though probably still a long way in the future yet, they are thrilling to contemplate.
There is no one who views the intriguing new horizons that are being opened up today in the radiation laboratories of universities and colleges of America but can see in the shadow of tomorrow a vast new power in the service of man. It is hoped that this service can indeed be made constructive and not destructive.
1. James Watt, famous inventor of the steam engine, when as a boy he saw forces in escaping steam at work raising the lid on his mothers teakettle, undoubtedly never dreamed of the possibility of vast forces within the atomic structure of the steam itself, which if harnessed would put into insignificance the engine he invented which itself brought on a worldwide industrial revolution.
2. That the sun is able to maintain its geometric size even though gigantic energies are radiating from its surface leads to the inevitable conclusion that utilization of subatomic energies within the sun itself must be at work to supply the vast reserves of energy necessary.
3. Dr. E. O. Lawrence, world-famous inventor of the Cyclotron, which two years ago won for him the Nobel Prize, causes positively charged atomic nuclei placed in a strong magnetic field to be driven with ever increasing speeds by rhythmic impulses, so that speeds of 10,000 miles per second are attained by the atomic nuclei, which are then used as the world’s most powerful atomic bullets in cracking the atomic structure of practically every known substance.
4. In Italy, hot gases from one of its volcanoes are made to pass through aluminum tubes, with water surrounding the tubes. Steam brought about by the evaporating of this water is used to drive a 10.000-horsepower steam turbine. One suggestion of how to utilize subatomic energy would be accomplished by capturing the heat caused by subatomic energies and its subsequent conversion into the steam in a somewhat similar procedure.
5. A source of light placed at the focus of a parabolic mirror causes its rays to be reflected from the surface of the mirror in a parallel direction. With an electromagnetic reflector constructed with parabolic reflective forces instead of the straight line forces used in the Cyclotron, the emanations of radioactive substances placed at its focal center would similarly be reflected in parallel directions, thus creating a reactive force that would tend to urge the fixed substance in a direction opposite to the rays. Here might be the suggestion for the operation of a rocket in the utilization of these subatomic forces.