Show RADIUM V t Among the many Important scientific llscoverles oC recent years few arc seemingly more notable than tho discovery dis-covery oC a new chemical element vhlch although not perhaps more powerful pow-erful than helium argon and other re centlydlscovurcd rlcmcnls is apparently appar-ently oC more practical use The elo nout wns discovered by M and Mme l Curie tv lio began the investigations eading to It In SOS soon after the discovery dis-covery of the Roentgen ray The latter lat-ter amazing disco ery recalled to the Curies an observation made by Bee qucrel that uranium and Its salts had d slight photogiaphlo influence Urn ilum Is obtained from pitchblende and jy experimenting with the latter the Curies ound that the radiant powers ccame more pronounced than in ura ilum as separated They then began to suspect the presence of an unknown clement and directed their energies to separating It from those already mown Eventually they found that two hitherto unknown elements were here and succeeded in distinguishing them Ono they called polonium the other radium the latter being the one whose existence hey I had first stumbled upon Polonium is believrtl to have live hundred limes the emis plvo power of uranium and its salts nit radium is estimated as having one hundred thousand limes the power of uranium The expectation expressed by the American chemist Prof Barker is that the new element will replace the Roentgen ray apparatus as a factor In surgery It is loss costly less complicated compli-cated and easier to manage Apparently Appar-ently the greatest difference between the two processes howevr is that the Xruy Is i produced by 1 transforming one kind of energy into another But radium ra-dium appears to act upon the photographic photo-graphic plate through opaque bodies without the aid of any known form of energy its own radiance Invisible as It is Is the potent factor It Is apparently appar-ently one oC those fairy tales of science sci-ence at which the world has ceased to marvel but which only deepen and widen the mystery surrounding the universe The importance to photography photog-raphy and surgery in this case is possibly possi-bly great although It Is but an extension exten-sion of the value of the Roentgen ray But the existence of an element so powerful and of such unsuspected powers pow-ers la a discovery that cannot fall to alter the Ideas of man concerning himself him-self and his environment If such power lurks latent even In the unsus pucjled elements of the mineral world It Is hardly to be doubted that there are more and greater wonders yet to bo revealed in the other unexplored regions re-gions Qf what we oall matter St Paul Pioneer Press V |