October 24, 1907] 



NATURE 



641 



An interesting volume ' has recently been published 

 giving a description of the new physical laboratories 

 and of the work done at the college during the occu- 

 pation of the chair of physics by Prof. Schuster. It was 

 compiled in commemoration of the twenty-fifth anni- 

 versary of his professorship, which was celebrated last 

 summer by a large gathering of his old students and 

 assistants, a specially bound copy being presented to 

 Dr. Schuster by them on the occasion. Its compila- 

 tion was largelv the work of Dr. Hutton, head of 

 the electrochemical department, who recently suc- 

 ceeded Dr. Lees, F.R.S., as assislant director of the 

 laboratory. This book contains plans of the building 

 and some excellent illustrations of the various depart- 

 ments, together with biographical notes and a biblio- 

 graphy of the scientific achievements of the professor, 

 his staff, and pupils during the period named. The 

 frontispiece of the work is a fine portrait of Prof. 

 Schuster, by Lafayette. 



As an account of the new laboratory appeared in 

 these columns previous to its opening by Lord Ray- 

 leigh in June, 1900,- attention will only be directed 

 here to a few of the more important features, and 

 more particularly those connected with the research 

 work. 



From his earliest associations with physical science 

 Prof. Schuster had always been specially interested 

 in spectroscopy, having received his inspiration from 

 contact with the foremost pioneers in this branch, 

 Bunsen, Kirchhoff, and Roscoe. Hence it was only 

 to be expected that the facilities for spectroscopic 

 research in the new laboratory should be of a unique 

 character. Probably one of the most important pieces 

 of special apparatus is the large concave grating of 

 21J feet radius, of very high quaUty, specially ruled by 

 the late Prof. Rowland for Dr. Schuster. The 

 mounting, the details of which have been improved 

 by Prof. Schuster, and subsequently by Mr. Duffield, 

 is arranged so that the grating and camera are fixed 

 to carriages, sliding on specially stout iron beams, so 

 connected that as the camera moves away from the 

 plate the grating moves towards it. With this 

 arrangement, as Rowland showed, the different por- 

 tions of the spectrum are always in focus, whatever 

 the position of the camera on its beam. Mr. Duffield 

 communicated last year to the British Association a 

 preliminary account of a research in which he has 

 been engaged using this equipment, for the study of 

 the effect of pressure on the arc-spectrum of iron, the 

 pressures being varied up to too atmospheres. 



Other spectroscopic apparatus are a 33-plate 

 echelon-spectroscope by Hilger; a printing compar- 

 ator for the measuring of spectrum photographs, from 

 the designs of Prof. Kayser ; a quartz spectrograph ; 

 and a smaller specially mounted concave Rowland 

 grating of one-metre radius. 



A very important development of the special work 

 of the laboratory is the department of electrochemistry, 

 which, owing to the efforts of Dr. Hutton and Dr. 

 Petavel, F.R.S., has now established a wide reputa- 

 tion. The details of the equipment have been pre- 

 viously described,^ but mention must be made of the 

 special electric furnace in which reactions can be 

 studied in gaseous pressures ranging up to 200 atmo- 

 spheres, and also of the various modifications of the 

 carbon-resistance furnace, designed by Dr. Hutton for 

 different purposes. Accounts of more than one impor- 



1 "The Physical Laboratories of the University of Manchester.'' A 

 record of twenty-five years' work. Prepared in commemoration of the 

 twenty-fifth anniversary of the election of Dr. A. Schuvter, F.R.S., to a 

 Professorship in the Owens College, by his students and assistants. Pp. 

 142. (Manchester ; The University Press.) Price 5,-. net. 



'- Nature, vol. Iviii., pp. 62T-2. 



3 Hutton and Petavel, Journ. Inst. Elec. Eng., 1903, vol. xxxii. pp. 

 222-247. 



NO. 1982, VOL. 76] 



tant research undertaken in the department are now 

 in the press. 



No record of the physical work at Manchester 

 would be complete without a reference to the long 

 series of painstaking researches by Dr. Lees on 

 thermal conductivity. ."Mone, and in conjunction with 

 students as collaborators, he has published during the 

 past fifteen years ten papers, many of them of great 

 importance on the subject. He was the first to work 

 with sufficient accuracy to determine with certainty 

 the sign of the temperature coefficient of thermal con- 

 ductivity in a number of materials, and the value of 

 his work was recognised by his election as a Fellow 

 of the Royal Society last year. 



The physical department at Manchester was one of 

 the first to recognise the importance of electrical 

 engineering, and in the old buildings a considerable 

 sub-department was the " dynamo house," where, 

 under Dr. Lees's tuition, many now occupying high 

 positions in the world of electrotechnics received their 

 training. When the department was reorganised on 

 a larger scale, the Hopkinson Memorial Wing was 

 built and equipped by the friends and relatives of the 

 late Dr. John Hopkinson for the purpose. This was 

 placed under the supervision of Dr. R. Beattie. In 

 this house and its annexes are installed a repre- 

 sentative collection of all the more important types 

 of modern machines, including specially designed 

 generators for e.xperimental work of all kinds, as 

 well as some machines of historic interest, such as 

 the pair of early alternators presented by Dr. Henry 

 Wilde, F.R.S., to illustrate the property of syn- 

 chronous running originally discovered by him. 



A meteorological station in Whitworth Park, 

 erected by the generosity of the Whitworth trustees, 

 has been splendidly equipped under the care of Dr. 

 C. G. Simpson, and quite recently a kite station at 

 Glossop Moor on the Derbyshire hills has been fitted 

 up under the superintendence of Dr. Petavel vi^ith 

 improved Dines apparatus, for winding in and paying 

 out the steel kite-wires, worked by a small engine. 

 This is the most westerly station in Europe for kite- 

 flying, and may therefore acquire considerable import- 

 ance in the international scheme for the investigation 

 of the upper atmosphere. 



Dr. Petavel's researches on radiation and on high- 

 pressure explosions led to his recently being elected 

 to the Fellowship of the Royal Society, and have 

 caused him to be regarded as an authority on both 

 these branches. 



After mention of these particular developments of 

 the work of the laboratory, we may note that in the 

 volume referred to, the mere bibliography of , the 

 scientific publications of Prof. Schuster and his pupils 

 occupies no less than eighty pages, covering an 

 extremely wide range. Students have been attracted 

 to the laboratory, not only from all parts of England, 

 but from abroad, especially of fate years. This is due 

 in some measure to the splendid provision made for 

 research, but undoubtedly in a greater degree to the 

 eminence Prof. Schuster has attained as an original 

 investigator, and pioneer in many important branches 

 of physics. His early work on the discharge of elec- 

 tricity through gases, carried out in the old building 

 with the help of his extremely able private assistant, 

 the late Mr. Arthur Stanton, contributed largely to 

 laying the foundations of the modern theory of the 

 charged atom, which has seen such marvellous devel- 

 opments at the hands of the Cambridge school of 

 physics. His work as an astrophysicist has taken 

 hiiii almost all over the world on eclipse expeditions, 

 and, as a representative either of the British Govern- 

 ment or of the Royal Society, to many scientific con- 



