Allen Scott9 Oregon State College; Ε, C. Lingafelter9 University of Washington; S. E. Haslet, State College of Washington, program chairman; R. H, Manley, Gen
eral Mills, Inc.; Wilson Compton,president, State Col' lege of Washington; and Harry L. Cole, also State Col lege, and chairman of Washington-Ida It ο Border Section
Northwest Regional Meeting Held at Moscow, Idaho A
Ν MAY 2 in Moscow, Idaho, John C . 0 Bailor, Jr., of t h e University of Illinois, told some 250 chemists at the opening session of the Northwest Regional Meet ing of the ACS that if the chemist i s to b e considered a professional man his period of training must be lengthened. H e sup ported this statement b y pointing out that while the man with a B.S. in chem istry considers himself a chemist, only t h e Ph.D. actually has an education com parable to the members of the medical and legal professions. H e further re minded his audience that within t h e past 25 years t h e amount of factual material available within the field of chemistry has expanded t o such a n extent that it is impossible to expound it in only t h e most superficial and mechanical way in a period of four years, even when no attempt is made to provide the liberal education e x pected of a professional man. I n addition t o the lengthening of t h e educational period, Dr. Bailor also sug gested that the chemistry curriculum be reorganized to accent fundamentals and minimize the amount of specific technical material presented. He applauded t h e tendency toward teaching both organic and inorganic chemistry from the basis of molecular structure and recommended that analytical courses be arranged t o demonstrate reaction mechanics rather than the efficacy of specific reagents. T h e speaker also quoted the job ex perience records of University of Illinois chemistry department alumni which indi cated strongly that the average graduate leaves laboratory practice of chemistry shortly after graduation. It was concluded that de-emphasis of laboratory techniques in favor of broadened education and in creased training in mental analysis is de sirable in the majority of cases. Following the opening speech a panel of local chemists composed of W . S. Ander son, president of Whitman College, R. E. Curtis o f General Electric's Hanford Works, Joseph Schulein of Oregon State College, H . V. Tartar of the University of Washington, and H . R. Erickson of the
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Tower Co. of Seattle, discussed the more specific aspects of the problem. The Washington-Idaho Border Section on the adjacent campuses of the Uni versity of Idaho and Washington State College was host to the 1947 Northwest Regional Meeting, the second to be held in this area. I t was sponsored by the Puget Sound, the Oregon, and the Wash ington-Idaho Border Section. The execu tive committee of the meeting has voted to hold the next convention in Portland, Ore., at a date yet to be determined. I n addition to the speakers at the general sessions, the meeting offered over 50 scientific papers presented at divisional meetings during the two-day program. The largest presentation was made by the Division of Physical and Inorganic Chem istry, which included a session devoted to physical methods of analysis. The other meetings of this division presented results from numerous research undertakings and included several reports from members of the faculty of the University of British Columbia. Chemists
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CHEMICAL
The sessions of the Division of In dustrial and Engineering Chemistry largely reflected the preoccupation of the Northwest with the products of its forests. Papers dealt with lignin and plywood adhesives and bark analysis and such related subjects. Outstanding exception to the trend was W. H. Carmody's report of the significant work being done by the Bureau of Mines a t Albany, Ore., on t h e recovery of zirconium metal from the zirconium sands found in that region. The biochemistry and agricultural chem istry divisions combined to present the re sults of t h e excellent work done by the faculties of the state colleges of Idaho, Oregon, and Washington to improve the farm product yield in this area and to in crease its market return. The organic chemists heard interesting papers on the syntheses of various organic compounds, as well as a series of miscel laneous papers including, again in tribute to the surrounding greenery, an estimate of the "Constitution of Mesquite Gum" by E . V. White of the University of Economics
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R. fl. Mfinley, General Mills, Inc., tin.il Isadora Perl man, Radiation. [xtboratory, University of California
Executive committee of the Northwest Regional Meeting: />. Λ. Gust of so η University of Ulaho; Leo Friedman and Joseph Schulein, Oregon State College; Carl M. Stevens and Harry L. Cole, State College of Washington; Herbert R. Erichson; Victorian Sivertz, University of Washington; Don H. Anderson, Uni versity of Idaho. Belotv. Members of the panel on Professional Training of Chem ists: W. S. Anderson, president of Whitman College: H. V. Tartar, University of Washington; R. Ε Curtis, General Electric1 s Hartford Works; Herbert R. Erichson
Idaho, and a rqxirt on "Jignin Sulfonic Acids" by O. P. Penitston and J. L . Mc Carthy of the University of Washington. The meeting ended tus it began, with a general session held nt Pullman, Wash., at which Isadore Perlman of the University of California Radiation Laboratory re viewed the historical preparation of the transuranium elements. Beginning with the discovery by Fermi in 1934 that neutron bombardment constituted a gen eral method of inducing radioactivity, Dr. Perlman traced the eventual production and identification of neptunium, plu tonium, curium, and finally americium. The speaker also drew the analogy be tween the rare earth transition series be ginning with lanthanum and the radio active scries in which the 5f electron shell may be beingfilledwith the first 5f electron appearing in thorium. The nomenclature of elements 95 and % has followed this assumption, americium being comparable to europium, and curium, named for the historical leading investigators in t h e field of radioactivity, being analogous to gadolinium named for Gadolin, t h e great investigator of the rare earths. Dr. Perlman also pointed o u t that quantitatively the radioactive isotopes have outstripped their more stable counterparts. Over 550 unstable iso topes have been reported with new ones being produced monthly while only 272 stable types have been discovered. At the convention dinner held at the Moscow Hotel, Ralph H. Manley, director of research for General Mills, emphasized the growing interdependence between re search and industry in a paper entitled "Current Trends in Industrial Research." He said that while t h e nature of industrial research is becoming increasingly basic there is a growing tendency to employ market analysis surveys to determine the goals at which the projects are aimed. During the years from 1940 t o 1946 the number of people engaged in industrial re search has nearly doubled s o that now workers in almost 2,500 industrial labora tories are spending over a quarter of a bil lion dollars in this work annually. At a luncheon the following day, Wilson Compton, president of Wasliington State College, spoke briefly, welcoming the chemists to the campus. V O L U M E
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Uranium Fission Yields M Elements I HE complete equation for the fission of uranium-235 as issued by the Plutonium Project [J. Am. Chem. Soc., 68, 2412-42 (1946)] was discussed by Aristid Von Crosse of the Houdry Process Corp. in a paper on the program of the Division of Physical and Inorganic Chemistry, AMERICAN CHEMICAL SOCIETY, at Atlantic
City. The equation represents the results of fission of 100 atoms of U 235 upon absorp tion of 100 neutrons and shows the forma tion of 34 different elements including a number of isotopes, 200 to 300 neutrons, and energy. The elements which occur in the largest quantities fall roughly into two groups, those with atomic weights from 85 to 100 and those from 130 to 150. Among the products are relatively large amounts of two of the newest elements, technetium (element 43) and element 61 (as y e t unnamed), which were positively identified in the uranium pile. For every 100 atoms of U 2 3 6 undergoing fission there are formed an average of 6.3 atoms of technetium and 2.6 atoms of element 61. The elements which predominate among the fission products arc: zirconium, 29.1 atoms; molybdenum, 25.2; neodymium, 21.8; barium, 18.7; xenon, 12.4; ruthenium, 12.4; cerium, 12.0; and cesium, 10.5. When 100 grams of U 2 3 5 undergo fission, all but about 0.1 gram is converted into the 34 fission products, pointed out Dr. Von Grosse, the remaining 0.1 gram being con verted into energy. T h e equation, which represents the condition of the products after about a week of radioactive decay, *
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is given below. All isotopes still radio active can be identified by the half-lives which follow each in parentheses. 100 U 235 atoms plus 1O0 neutrons gives Light group elements 72 0.000015 Ge , 0.0001 Ge 73 , 0.0002 Ge7*, 7 0.002 Ge « 0.0008 As7» 0.0091 Se7 77, 0.020 Se7S, 0.OS0 Se»0, 0.25 Se8* 0.040 Br », 0.13 Br*» 0.40 Kr*3, 0.65 Kr84, 1.2 Kr'« (10 years), 2.0 Kr«« 2.8 Rb" (6.3 X 10»° years) 3.70 Sr«* 4.6 Y8» 5.0 Zr",3 5.4 Zr»», 5.8 Zr**, 6.3 Zr»4, 6.6 Zr»· 6.1 Ob» 6.4 Mo·*, 6.6 Mo97. 6.4 Mo6 96, 5.S Mo"» 6.2 Element 43** (4 Χ 10 years) 5.2 Ru 1013, 4.6 Ru»02, 2.6 Ru 1 * 4 3.7 Rh'» 0.90 Pd»°», 0.50 Pd1M, 0.10 Pd">8. 0.017 Pd»»· 0.20 Ag1071 , 0.28 Ag»°» 2 0.0131 Cd »», 0.012 Cd» , 0.O11 Cd"*, 0.010 Cd ", 0.010 Cd»6 0.010 In11»17 0.010 Sn» Heavy group dements 0.011 22Sn»18, 0.012 Sn"*, 0.O13 Sn»2°, 0.015 Sn' , 0.020 Sn»" 28 0.014 Sb' 21ei , 0.017 Sb»26 0.023 Te» , 0.030 Te» , 0.04 Te 128 , 1.70 Te»30 0.18 I»27 29 1.00 Xe» , 2.6 Xe»3', 3.6 Xe 1 3 2 , 5.2 X e l » 4.5 Cs»,333, 6.0 Cs»337 * (25,000 years) 6.1 Ba «, 6.3 Ba» , 6.3 Ba»« 6.3 La'» 6.2 Ce'«\ 5.8 Ce»« 5.9 Pr>« 3 5.5 Nd»« , 5.2 Nd>", 4.6 Nd 1 * 8 , 3.5 Nd"·, 2.0 Nd»48, 1.0Nd'"> 2.6 Element 61 »« (3.7 years) 1.4 Sra'«, 0.38 Sm»«, 0.1O S m · " 0.60 Eu™', 0.15 Eu 1M 0.03 Gd»", 0.013 Gd»*«, O.0O74 Gd»«7, 0.002 Gd»" 200 to 300 neutrons plus energy 1509
