Section A .-.»y' • ^ 



ASTRONOMY, MATHEMATICS ■ - ,. - 



and PHYSICS "^"^ 



ADDRESS BY THE PRESIDENT: • % « % . Q 



Professor T. H. LABY, B.A., ' ' >^' 



Professor of Physics in the Victoria College, Wellington, N.Z. 



SOME RECENT ADVANCES IN PHYSICS. 



Science in Australia by the departure of Professor Bragg to 

 England lost a mathematician and physicist, and a man whom 

 for many reasons the small band of workers in physics could ill 

 spare. But the wider influence which Professor Bragg has is a gain 

 to science generally. 



Cambridge has recently celebrated the twenty-fifth anniversary 

 of Sir J. J. Thomson's appointment to the Cavendish Chair ot 

 Physics, by the publication of a History of the Cavendish Labora- 

 tory. As in every case the chapters of that book have been written 

 by distinguished physicists from personal knowledge of their 

 period, the volume, as an exact and illuminative history of possibly 

 England's greatest scientific centre, is w^orthy of the wide influence 

 of a most inspiring investigator. All physicists will join in hoping 

 that Sir J. J. Thomson may continue to occupy the Cavendish 

 Chair for a future period as full of achievement as that which the 

 History commemorates. 



It is a matter of some satisfaction to find that physicists first 

 trained in Australasian Universities are contributing to science in all 

 parts of the world. Most of the theories and discoveries in radio- 

 activity we owe to Professor Rutherford, formerly of Christchurch, 

 N.Z., ; new views as to the conduction of electricity through gases 

 to Professor Wellisch, a Sydney graduate ; important contri- 

 butions to the theory of light, and high administrative work, to 

 President MacLaurin, formerly of Auckland ; many and varied 

 researches in ionisation to Dr. Kleeman, a South AustraUan ; the 

 organisation of metallurgical research at the National Physical 

 Laboratory, London, to Dr. Rosenhain, of Melbourne University ; 

 the organisation of an institution for the training of those engaged 

 in the London optical industries to Mr. Chalmers, a Sydney 

 graduate ; a number of spectroscopic researches we owe to Pro- 

 fessor Duftield, formerly of the University of Adelaide ; Professor 



