208 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1944 
the illuminating units are made of block-crystal quartz, quartz being 
especially transparent to ultraviolet radiations. 
The illuminating unit used for examining the filterable forms of 
disease organisms contains 14 lenses and prisms, 3 of which are in the 
high-intensity incandescent lamp, 4 in the Risley prism, and 7 in the 
achromatic condenser which, incidentally, has a numerical aperture 
of 1.40. Between the source of light and the specimen are subtended 
two circular, wedge-shaped, block-crystal quartz prisms for the pur- 
pose of polarizing the light passing through the specimen, polarization 
being the practical application of the theory that light waves vibrate in 
all planes perpendicular to the direction in which they are propagated. 
Therefore, when light comes into contact with a polarizing prism, it 
is divided or split into two beams, one of which is refracted to such an 
extent that it is reflected to the side of the prism without, of course, 
passing through the prism while the second ray, bent considerably less, 
is thus enabled to pass through the prism to illuminate the specimen. 
When the quartz prisms on the universal microscope, which may be 
rotated with vernier control through 360°, are rotated in opposite 
directions, they serve to bend the transmitted beams of light at variable 
angles of incidence while, at the same time, a spectrum is projected 
up into the axis of the microscope, or rather a small portion of a spec- 
trum since only a part of a band of color is visible at any one time.. 
However, it is possible to proceed in this way from one end of the spec- 
trum to the other, going all the way from the infrared to the ultra- 
violet. Now, when that portion of the spectrum is reached in which 
both the organism and the color band vibrate in exact accord, one with 
the other, a definite characteristic spectrum is emitted by the organism. 
In the case of the filter-passing form of the Bacillus typhosus, for 
instance, a blue spectrum is emitted and the plane of polarization 
deviated plus 4.8°. The predominating chemical constituents of the 
organism are next ascertained after which the quartz prisms are ad- 
justed or set, by means of vernier control, to minus 4.8° (again in the 
case of the filter-passing form of the Bacillus typhosus) so that the 
opposite angle of refraction may be obtained. A monochromatic 
beam of light, corresponding exactly to the frequency of the organism 
(for Dr. Rife has found that each disease organism responds to and 
has a definite and distinct wave length, a fact confirmed by British 
medical research workers) is then sent up through the specimen and 
the direct transmitted light, thus enabling the observer to view the 
organism stained in its true chemical color and revealing its own 
individual structure in a field which is brilliant with light. 
The objectives used on the universal microscope are a 1.12 dry lens, 
a 1.16 water immersion, a 1.18 oil immersion, and a 1.25 oil immersion. 
The rays of light refracted by the specimen enter the objective and are 
