Industrial Research 



359 



world. The studj- of the nutritive content of soils is a 

 primary concern of the geochemist, and very much work 

 has been done here. The study of soil erosion is of such 

 oustanding national imjjort, and has been so highly 

 publicized in recent years that further mention need not 

 be made of it. 



Rheology 



Rhcology, the science of flow, is so closely associated 

 in its work with the sciences of mechanics and of physical 

 chemistrj' that it has only fairh- recently been distin- 

 guished from them as a separate discipline. It is very 

 probable that the force which brought about this dis- 

 tinction was the unusual industrial applicability of the 

 techniques of the science. Fairly recently the science 

 of rhcology has acquired an American journal devoted 

 to its work and the status of an essentially separate 

 science. 



Since rheologj' is primarily concerned with the 

 process and mechanics of flow in gaseous, liquid, and 

 solid substances, there are very few industrial processes 

 to which the properties of materials are of predominant 

 importance which do not employ it. It is important in 

 studies of the rates of flow, the viscosity, the turbulence 

 of flow of gases in heating plants and in mdustries 

 manufacturing gaseous products. It is highly impor- 

 tant to the aeronautical industry, for studies of the rheo- 

 logical characteristics of air are of extreme interest to 

 the aeronautical engineer. Studies of processes of 

 liquid flow are indispensable to the chemical engineer, 

 who may have to deal with liquid flow on a plant scale. 

 Studies of flow in both Uquids and solids are vital to 

 such chemical enterprises as the plastics industry, 

 where the control of major processes depends upon 

 frequent accurate determinations of viscosity in the 

 liquid phase, and the rate of flow or deformation in the 

 solid condition. The question is of equal importance 

 to the glass uidustrj^, to many food industries, and 

 indeed to any industrial process where the physical 

 state of the product must be altered during preparation. 

 Determinations of viscosity constitute one of the most 

 delicate and reliable indicators of the progress of a 

 chemical reaction, and one of the most outstanding 

 processing characteristics of many valuable chemical 

 products. Rheology is also the handmaiden of many 

 of the engineering sciences, being notably useful to 

 engineers engaged in road building, in the engineering 

 of water%vays, and, through its contributions to the 

 study of photoelasticity, in structural engineering. 

 Wherever the flow of Uquids or the deformation of 

 solids must be adequately determined, dependence is 

 placed upon the rheologist. 



Rheolog}' is a border-line science in the sense that it 

 depends upon specialized branches of physics and physi- 

 cal chemistry. It has essentially taken these over 



unchanged, however, and merely combined them for 

 use. Li this sense, it is less specifically a border-line 

 field, and more nearly represents a combination of two 

 already highly dcvoloped branches of science. For 

 this reason, the student desiring to enter rheology as a 

 profession possesses rather good educational advan- 

 tages. His field will not require so broad or general 

 an education as is demanded by some, and he will be 

 able to adopt the educational facilities already available. 

 The design of specialized rlieological courses in the 

 universities, however, has none the less lagged consid- 

 erably behind the need for them, and the initiation of 

 such courses, ready-made after careful consideration, 

 would constitute a boon to a very wide section of Ameri- 

 can industry. 



Conclusion 



It has been the purpose of this section only to draw 

 some attention to the immense importance of border- 

 line fields of research in our national scene, and to 

 attempt by citing a few specific industrial examples 

 further to emphasize and delineate the picture. There 



Figure 103. — Source of Pure Beams of Protons for Biophysical 



Research 



