B.— CHEMISTRY. Gl 



but it is not too much to expect that the industry will take every means 

 to foster and encourage abstract research in our university institutions, 

 and even to give some hint as to the direction in which its experience 

 leads it to think that advances may be made. There is at present n"b 

 organisation which can bring the manufacturers of dyestuffs and inter- 

 mediates into touch with the work being carried on in our university 

 laboratories, and it is possible that if at the present time a valuable dis- 

 covery were to be made it would be unrecognised as such, and, following 

 the usual course of academic research, would be published and thus lost 

 to the country. What is required is a lead from manufacturers which 

 will indicate the matters which they regard of importance, but which 

 they do not consider as likely to yield results sufficiently quickly to justify 

 them in employing their own research stafE for investigating them. This 

 aspect is of all the more importance at the present time, when organic 

 chemistry is entering on a new phase which will undoubtedly revolutionise 

 many of the existing processes of manufacture. It is now recognised that 

 the presence of a small quantity of a catalyst may either alter the course 

 of a reaction or may lead it to proceed to completion where otherwise a 

 totally inadequate yield would be obtained. The catalyst may either 

 be added or the containing walls of the reaction vessel may act in this 

 capacity. The well-known example of the oxidation of naphthalene to 

 phthalic anhydride by vanadium pentoxidc is an example of this, but 

 similar cases are continually recurring, and it has only recently been 

 found that the classical method for preparing ketones by the distillation 

 of the calcium salt of the appropriate acid can be utilised in the most 

 unexpected directions if the thorium salt instead of the calcium salt is 

 employed. It is perhaps appropriate to conclude this section by the 

 following quotation from the United States Tariff Commission Report, 

 No. 32 :— 



' The acute shortage of dyes arising in the various dye-consuming 

 markets, due to the disappearance of German dyes shortly after the 

 beginning of the war, was soon followed by prices of unprecedented levels, 

 while certain dyes were not to be had at any price. This dye famine 

 threatened the activities of the vast textile industries, as well as other 

 industries dependent upon dyes for their operation. The manufacture of 

 dyes was soon entered upon in the United States, Great Britain, France 

 and Italy, and each of these countries has developed a dye industry capable 

 of supplying from 80 to 90 per cent, of its requirements and has, in 

 addition, exported significant quantities of dyes since the war. As a 

 result of this remarkable period of expansion and development the world's 

 present capacity to produce dyes is nearly double that of the pre-war 

 period. This existing capacity to produce over and above normal require- 

 ments is resulting in an era of severe competition in the world's markets 

 which may eliminate many of the plants now in operation. The German 

 industry has certain advantages over the industries of the new producing 

 countries, including cumulative experience, unified organisation for buying 

 and selling, and lower manufacturing costs. The high post-war price 

 levels of dyes exported from Germany would appear to indicate a strong 

 probability of price reductions during the next few years. The com- 

 mercial warfare which is likely to follow may involve the utilisation of 



