| RefNo | MS/603/10/62 |
| Previous numbers | 1834 |
| Level | Item |
| Title | Letter from Frederick Soddy, the University, Glasgow, to [Joseph] Larmor |
| Creator | Soddy; Frederick (1877-1956); British chemist and social commentator |
| Recipient | Larmor; Sir Joseph (1857-1942); Irish theoretical physicist |
| Date | 29 April 1907 |
| Description | He is grateful for the information on sealed communications to the Royal Society. He has been pushing his reults on gases a little further with [Thomas D.] Mackenzie, a Carnegie scholar. Soddy describes filling six spectrum tubes with helium at various pressures, the resulting expeiments in which they became nonconducting, and the resulting pressure after opening up under mercury: '...the helium immediately started coming out if the film of volatilised aluminium from the electrodes as it was attacked by the mercury & nearly all the He that had disappeared was recovered in this way'. He describes additional pressure experiments with a McLeod gauge, and at all pressures the tube is brilliantly fluorescent under the discharge. It presents the appearence of being exhausted to a high degree of vacuum. He will examine the compound of helium and aluminium further, and concludes by admitting that Larmor's views on the relative, rather than the absolute inertness of these gases may be more correct than Soddy's original position. |
| Extent | 4p. |
| Format | Manuscript |
| PhysicalDescription | Ink on paper |
| AccessStatus | Open |
Fellows associated with this archive
| Code | PersonName | Dates |
| NA8018 | Soddy; Frederick (1877 - 1956) | 1877 - 1956 |