CULTURAL VALUES 0¥ PHYSICS — DIETZ 145 



which had been connected to a toy electric motor, the sort you might 

 buy for a small boy at Christmas. When sunlight fell upon the 

 cells, enough electricity was generated to run the motor. The re- 

 search men referred to the motor laughingly as "a 1 fly-power 

 motor." But, again, it must be remembered that we were looking 

 at a scientific baby. 



Perhaps the day will come when our houses will be roofed with 

 photoelectric cells, instead of shingles, and we will make electricity, 

 instead of hay, while the sun shines. 



It is of the utmost significance that during the present year both 

 Harvard University and Massachusetts Institute of Teclmology 

 were given funds totaling about $1,000,000 by Dr. Godfrey L. 

 Cabot to investigate the problem of solar energy. M. I. T. is to 

 concentrate upon the direct utilization of solar energy by such 

 means as I have been describing, while Harvard is to investigate 

 photosynthesis, the method by which plants utilize solar energy. 



Another direction in which many scientists are looking for a new 

 source of energy is the interior of the atom. That the conversion 

 of matter into energy would release tremendous stores of power was 

 shown as early as 1905 when Albert Einstein wrote his equations 

 for the inertia of energy. Experiments in artificial radioactivity 

 during the last 5 years have confirmed these equations of Einstein. 



As you know, it has been calculated that the atomic energy in a 

 glass of water would be enough to drive an ocean liner from New 

 York to Cherbourg and back again. It is easy to see how different 

 a world this would be if, instead of filling your automobile tank 

 with gasoline every other day, you merely filled it with water once 

 a year. 



Second in importance to power in this world of ours, is the pos- 

 session of raw materials. Here again we are fortunate to be citizens 

 of America since this Nation is the largest owner, producer, and con- 

 sumer of minerals, leading in the production of iron, copper, lead, 

 zinc, aluminum, phosphates, gypsum, and sulphur (5). 



But the world's gi-eatest reservoir of minerals is the ocean. A 

 new world would dawn if we once learned to mine the ocean suc- 

 cessfully. This is not as wild an idea as it sounds, for, as many of 

 you know, a successful beginning has already been made. 



If you use ethyl gasoline in your automobile, the chances are 

 that it was made with bromine that was mined from the ocean. At 

 Kure Beach, near Wilmington, N. C, is the plant of the Ethyl- 

 Dow Chemical Co. Sea water is pumped through the plant and 

 bromine extracted from it by a relatively simple chemical process. 



During the course of a year, the two giant, electrically driven cen- 

 trifugal pumps lift about a square mile of ocean, 80 feet deep, into 

 the towers of the Ethyl-Dow plant at Kure Beach. Chemists of the 



