Maynard Shipley

“ When ultra-violet light is allowed to fall upon a metal it causes the metal to emit electrons and thus to acquire a positive charge, the velocity of the emitted electrons being exactly proportional to the frequency of the incident light. Or when light of X-ray type falls upon the surface of almost any substance, it takes hold of an electron in the atoms of that surface and hurls it out into space with a speed exactly proportional to the wave length of the light. ”

“ As is well known, it is not difficult to make an X-ray picture of the bones of the body. They are so much denser than the soft parts of the body that, even with the ordinary photographic plate, it has been possible to photograph them fairly well. By pumping the stomach full of gas or air—which are highly transparent to the [Pg 22] X-rays—and then applying the X-ray, it has sometimes been possible to locate the beginnings of cancer of the stomach, and the place of malignant growth. ”

“ Levick first deduced that neurasthenia in grown-ups and rickets in the young are due to the same cause. Both these diseases, he claims, are nutritional disturbances of the nerve centers affecting the bones in the young, and the nervous systems in the old. The action of sunlight on the skin forms a substance which is carried into the blood and feeds the nerve centers as well as the bones. His success in treating neurasthenia with sun’s rays led him to apply it to cases of infantile paralysis, a disease which is a severe shock to the nervous system and which results in muscular atrophy. ”

“ A well-known mechanical engineer said recently that in ten years a metallurgical X-ray machine will be as vital a part of the equipment in an automobile repair shop, a foundry, or machine shop as it is now in a dentist’s office.”
We are assured by The Iron Trade (73:26) that “the practice of analyzing metals by means of X-rays is only in its infancy. There is every reason to believe that soon great advances will be made in determining the crystallization and therefore the properties of metals. ”

“ The X-rays that are being used to cure a patient may at the same time inflict radio-dermatitis on other persons exposed to their influence in adjoining rooms or buildings. Nothing will suffice for safety but to cover the walls and floors of X-ray rooms with sheets of lead from a quarter to half an inch thick, according to the power of the source and its distance from the lining....
“Biologic reactions from X-rays take two forms. The first is a skin lesion known as radio-dermatitis, caused by the skin’s absorbing a large quantity of radiations. ”

“ Every crystal has its characteristic X-ray spectrum and can be identified thereby even when the individual crystals are beyond the resolving power of the microscope and the substance is in danger of being called amorphous. ”

“ X-rays constitute the only sure way to tell good eggs from bad. Pass each egg in turn through the X-rays and let its shadow fall on a chemical screen. You will see exactly what is inside each egg. The [Pg 9] ones containing hopeful chicks may be rejected.”
One of the most remarkable economic or biological uses of the X-ray so far developed is the study of silk-worms and their diseases. The Silk Association of America has established a laboratory—Department of Sericulture—in the Canton Christian College, presided over by a staff of Chinese and foreign entomologists. ”

“ Highly important as are the phenomena of Radioactivity from the physical, chemical, medical, and philosophic points of view, they are hardly comparable in their relations to the affairs of our everyday life to the Roentgen or X-rays, and to the invisible violet or ultra-violet rays. The X-rays are utilized today in hundreds of practical ways, and are vastly important also in surgery, medicine, dentistry, and in biological investigations. ”

“ Arc lights throwing powerful ultra-violet rays are being installed in beauty shops and hotels, and patrons are given opportunity to bathe their bodies in this brilliance. These rays are being billed as more potent than sun baths, and citizens who have small chance to see the orb of day get their sunshine and their medicine at one swoop.”
Two Indian scientists, S. S. Bhatnagar and R. B. Lal, of the University of the Punjab, Lahore, discovered in 1925 that germs grow faster when exposed to “polarized” light than to ordinary light. ”

“ The ultra-violet rays bring their effect through the medium of certain compounds widely distributed in plant and animal tissue, so that practically any foodstuff can be ‘anti-rachitically’ activated. ‘Make hay while the sun shines’ is more than a mere poetic slogan, for hay made in the dark is devoid of rickets-preventing properties” (Science, December 4, 1925) .
The careful experiments of J. S. Hughes showed that chickens receiving a standard scratch feed and mash, supplemented with sprouted oats and buttermilk, developed rickets (weak legs) when deprived of direct sunlight. ”

“ The first X-ray pictures ever taken of a mummy were completed by scientists at the American Museum of Natural History, New York City. The pictures showing the skeleton in detail are expected to be a great aid in studying the development of bone formations in the evolution of man. This first subject of the scientists’ X-ray was a South American Indian mummy. Fake mummies, like false gems, are instantly detected by X-ray methods.
One of the methods used for detecting the theft of diamonds at the mines is to examine the workmen with X-rays. ”

“ Then, since it is impossible to make such experiments on human bodies, we shall collect data based on 25 years’ experience with X-rays to see whether physicians in close contact have been burned.”
While X-ray treatment cannot be said to cure a deep-seated cancer, it is undoubtedly being given with highly beneficial results in many cases, alleviating much suffering and retarding the growth of malignant tissues. ”

“ In the early days of X-ray therapy the nature and effects of these radiations were wholly unknown. Operators did not hesitate to test [Pg 31] and adjust their tubes by throwing the shadow of their hands on the flouroscope. X-rays do not make objects visible to the human eye, and to see the effects of them it is necessary to interpose a special screen between the eyes and object through which the X-rays are to penetrate. The cardboard screen is coated with a fluorescent substance, such as barium-platinum-cyanide, or calcium tungstate. ”

“ Synthetic sunlight produced by him with an electric arc light of his own invention proved as good as natural sunlight, and could be better regulated to the patient’s endurance. He used two distinct kinds of light-rays, the short ultra-violet rays for nerve nutrition, and the long red and infra-red rays for muscle treatment. Red rays, as can be seen when the hand is held up against the sunlight, penetrate the flesh to a considerable extent, and can therefore stimulate the sleeping muscle. ”

“ At any rate, it was found that the milk from cows deprived of sunlight and ultra-violet light was quite deficient in the anti-rachitic factor. Animals and birds fed on the sunless milk uniformly developed rickets.
The Holstein-Friesian cows used in the experiments were of nearly the same age and calving date and all received like treatment as to feed, temperature, etc., and stood side by side in the same barn. “Throughout the treatment,” says Dr. Gowen, “these cows did not leave the barn. For one month none of the cows received ultra-violet light. ”

“ But not all kinds of foodstuffs by any means are favorably affected by the rays. Only those foods which contain fat seem to be [Pg 54] materially improved. The value of milk and of cod liver oil is greatly enhanced by exposure to the rays. Dr. Benjamin Kramer has been highly successful in treating babies affected with rickets by subjecting milk itself to the action of ultra-violet light. [3]
As early as 1923, it had been shown by feeding experiments with various types of animals at the University of Wisconsin that sunlight was acting either directly upon the animal or upon its food. ”

“ It has been found that actively growing tissue, whether normal or pathological, is the most susceptible to X-rays, and it is comparatively easy to sterilize a number of species of animals without otherwise injuring them. ”

“ That both the compound rays of ordinary sunlight and ultra-violet rays (“artificial sunlight”) are highly effective in the treatment of a number of complaints is now well known. They are both in general use for the external treatment of rickets, tuberculosis, and a number of other diseases. Light-rays are also applied to hasten the healing of wounds. ”

“ While experimenting with a highly exhausted vacuum tube on the conductivity of electricity through gases, Dr. Roentgen noticed that a paper screen covered with potassium platinocyanide—a phosphorescent substance—which chanced to be lying nearby, became fluorescent under action of some radiation emitted from the tube, which at the time was enclosed in a box of black cardboard. Professor Roentgen then found, by experiment, that this heretofore unknown radiation had the power to pass through various substances which are impenetrable to ordinary light-rays. ”

“ With the very weak radiation that I have used for my experiments, corresponding to the ordinary radiographic and radioscopic work, it has been easy for me to obtain images of metallic objects and human bones placed on a sensitive plate 15 feet from the radiating source, although the rays pass directly through a slab of marble an inch thick, a sheet of lead one-tenth of an inch thick, and a flooring eight inches deep, built of oak boards and rough plaster. ”

“ I. Seth Hirsch, head of the X-ray department of the Bellevue Hospital in New York, gave a drastic treatment—for cancer—of four periods of 16 hours each with the X-rays at 250,000 volts, apparently with satisfactory results. The patient suffered no pain or inconvenience during the treatment with the exception of occasional nausea. A year later an experiment was made in a Philadelphia laboratory where an X-ray treatment of 300,000 volts was used. It seems that alleviation [Pg 20] rather than cure has been the result of nearly all cases where cancer had been well advanced. ”

“ Moreover, what is to prevent two different kinds of red flowers from giving out two entirely different sets of wave lengths in the ultra-violet, and thus appearing to have entirely different colors to an insect?”
In a very real sense, science is only at the beginning of the discoveries it will yet make in its investigations of the nature and action of ultra-violet, cathode and X-rays. ”

“ Physicians say further amputations are inevitable, and that these will result in Vaillant’s death.
In 1921, the eminent English radiologists, Dr. Cecil Lyster and Dr. Ironside Bruce, and Dr. Adolphe Leroy of the St. Antonie Hospital in Paris, died martyrs to their noble profession. “All of these men went knowingly to death. Perhaps they did not take their sacrifices in the spirit of the saint, possessed by a vision of suffering humanity. Theirs may have been the ardor of the scientist, the endurance of a worker who hears the challenge of nature’s silence and goes to battle. ”

“ The only creature that has porphyrin as part of its normal body-covering is a tropical bird called the touraco, parts of whose feathers are dyed a brilliant red by a porphyrin-copper compound known as turacin. This pigment is remarkable also because it seems to be the only normal occurrence of copper as a coloring compound in feathers or skin. ”

“ Lazarus-Barlow, Professor of Experimental Pathology in the University of London, concludes that even though heat-rays may also play some part in curative processes, “experience of the treatment of wounds by sunlight in France during the World War indicated that a degree of benefit arises from exposure to sunlight which cannot be attributable to warmth and ultra-violet rays. ”

“ The penetrating power (“hardness”) of these rays appears to be determined solely by the nature of the elements in the emitting substance. The velocity of the cathodic (or secondary Roentgen) rays seems to be quite independent of the matter exposed to the primary rays, but increases as the hardness (penetrating power) of the primary Roentgen rays increases.
The character of the emitted rays, in brief, appears to be quite unaffected by the chemical or physical condition of the element. Red-hot iron, for example, exhibits the same characteristic Roentgen radiation as iron at room temperature. ”

“ The X-rays are also used to determine the quality of the fabric in automobile tires, and even to detect irregularities in the centers of golf balls, and to reveal why some of them fly straighter and farther than others. ”

“ Rollier, exposure of the diseased to the sun’s rays is efficacious in the treatment of anemia, malnutrition, bone and gland infections and various types of tuberculosis, and is a body builder for convalescents. ”

“ Numerous autopsies on deceased members of the silk-worm tribe revealed that from 50 to 100 percent of the worms raised in South China were infected with diseases that made the infant mortality rate excessively high and destroyed the value of the silk from those hardy enough to survive. ”

“ Prolonged exposure to the ultra-violet rays will destroy any germs known to science. (Cathode rays—which are shorter than ultra-violet rays—will kill not only germs, but insects as well, by means of a device developed by Prof. W. D. Coolidge.) ”

“ It was found also that the fats might be activated by the rays from the open carbon arc, the iron [Pg 57] arc, and sunlight; but that exposure for such prolonged periods as 17 hours destroyed their potency. This destruction took place even on cod liver oil. [5]
It has long been known that human tissue is more actively changed by light when it has been “sensitized.” Quinine, esculin, fluoresceine, etc., are examples of tissue sensitizers, in addition to their other effects. The most powerful of all known sensitizers is haemato-porphyrin—or simply “porphyrin.” ”

“ Ultra-violet rays affect life. The amount of ultra-violet coming from the sun is variable. Does this mean that some of the obscure, day by day variations of health can be due to this? Some days everybody seems happy and cheerful. ”