542 



NATURE 



[January 14, 19 15 



development of the arts and industries is intrinsically 

 sound from the intellectual as well as from the prac- 

 tical point of view. " A letter by Mr. C. R. Darling 

 in the Journal of the Society of Arts (December i8) 

 emphasises in a similar way the fact that ".if we are 

 to have that co-ordination between the teacher and 

 manufacturer that e.xists in Germany to the great 

 advantage of both, the teaching of chemistry must 

 not, as at present, be mainly confined to the cloister. 

 We must either introduce courses of instruction in 

 industrial chemistry into our existing colleges and 

 universities, conducted by men of experience, or create 

 new institutions for the purpose. So long as educa- 

 tional authorities regard the possession of a degree as 

 the only criterion of ability, and form their staffs 

 almost exclusively of men who have had no industrial 

 experience, they will never give that effective assist- 

 ance to the manufacturers which will enable us to 

 hold our own in the sphere of chemical industry." 



Among the various uses to which oils are put is 

 their employment by electrical engineers for the insu- 

 lation of oil-immersed transformers and for surround- 

 ing the breaking contacts of high-tension switches. 

 Special qualities of oil are necessary and a good deal 

 of research has been going on as to the selection and 

 testing of suitable oils for these purposes. A quantity 

 of information has been collected by a research sub- 

 committee of the Institution of Electrical Engineers, 

 and is embodied in a report just issued. The chief 

 troubles are the deterioration of the oil by the gradual 

 formation of sludge and the lowering of its quality 

 as a dielectric by the absorption of moisture. This 

 sludge now appears to be due to the formation of 

 complex organic acids, dehydrogenated hydrocarbons, 

 and oxidised resinous asphaltones of the mineral oil 

 originally used. The formation of these compounds 

 is accelerated by increase of temperature, and for 

 testing purposes they can be rapidly produced by 

 exposing the oil to ozone. The effect of sludging, 

 although impeding the required circulation of oil in a 

 transformer, does not affect its dielectric quality so 

 much as the absorption of moisture, and this is so 

 serious that the presence of a small percentage of 

 water in the oil is more easily detected by electrical 

 tests than by purely chemical methods. 



Hitherto the manufacture of the well-known anti- 

 septic, thymol, has been practically confined to Ger- 

 many, notwithstanding the fact that ajowan seeds, 

 the oil from which is almost the sole source of com- 

 mercial thymol, are grown on a large scale only in 

 India, which has thus been supplying Germany with 

 the raw material of a valuable industry. No further 

 supplies of thymol being forthcoming from Germany 

 owing to the war, the price had increased almost 

 eight-fold by September last, and is even now 21s. 6d. 

 per lb., as against 55. per lb. before the war. There 

 is every reason why the United Kingdom should now 

 become the chief centre of the manufacture of thymol. 

 The manufacturing process is quite simple, and ample 

 supplies of ajowan seed are available in India. The 

 Imperial Institute, which has devoted attention to this 

 NO. 2359, VOL. 94] 



subject, has now made inquiries in India, and is pre- 

 pared to put intending British manufacturers of thymol 

 in touch with Indian exporters of the seed. For- 

 tunately, too, a British possession can provide a- 

 substitute for thymol if such be required. This sub- 

 stance is carvacrol, which is obtained from oils 

 derived from a variety of plants, but particularly from 

 the origanum of Cyprus, At the instance of the 

 Imperial Institute this Cyprus origanum oil is already 

 being produced in commercial quantities from wild 

 plants in Cyprus, and in 1913 was exported thence 

 to the United Kingdom to the value of 980Z. It is 

 believed that the plant can be cultivated profitably and 

 on a large scale in Cyprus, and experiments in this 

 direction are understood to have been begun. 



The first report of the Board of Trade Committee 

 on bulkheads and water-tight compartments, presided 

 over by Sir Archibald Denny, has now been issued, 

 and forms the subject of the leading article in 

 Engineering for January 8. The committee has now 

 been at work for nearly two and a half years, and 

 the first report deals with foreign-going steamers 

 carrying more than twelve passengers. It is not 

 possible even to mention all the points covered by 

 this comprehensive report, but we note that the com- 

 mittee has given a clearly defined method for the con- 

 struction of flooding curves and tables. Full calcula- 

 tions were made for several actual vessels of widely 

 different types, and from these, together with the 

 general laws governing flooding calculations, a 

 method of preparing flooding curves from simple 

 data was devised. The method was tested by apply- 

 ing it to a number of actual vessels, and comparing 

 the results with those given by full flooding calcula- 

 tions for the same vessels. The Committee is right 

 in claiming that the formulation and enforcement of 

 rules governing subdivision is a contribution of the 

 utmost importance to the subject of safety of life at 

 sea. 



We have received an interesting pamphlet from the 

 Bonecourt Waste Heat Boiler Co., Ltd., of Parliament 

 Mansions, Westminster, in which is described a 

 method of raising steam for power, heating, or other 

 purposes by utilising the heat carried away in the pro- 

 ducts of combustion of internal-combustion engines 

 and metallurgical furnaces. In general, the exhaust 

 gases from an internal-combustion engine contain 

 from 30 to 45 per cent, of the total heat available in 

 the fuel supply, and these gases leave the engine at a 

 fairly high temperature. In the Bonecourt system 

 the exhaust gases from the engine are passed through 

 internal tubes in a small steam boiler. At full engine 

 load it is claimed that from 3 to 3-5 lb. of water can 

 be evaporated from and at 100° C. per hour per brake- 

 horse-power of the engine, with no additional cost for 

 fuel. In other types of boiler made by the firm, both 

 fuel firing in an ordinary grate and heating by exhaust 

 gases are combined. Small tubes take the products of 

 combustion from the coal-fired grate and separate larger 

 tubes in the same boiler receive the engine exhaust 

 gases. A boiler 7 ft. in diameter by 6 ft. long would be 



