A NEW METHOD.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 40, 17 February 1914, Page 4

A NEW METHOD.

American physicians and scientists were considerably amazed on a certain Saturday at the end of December by a demonstration of an entirely new method of producing X-rays discovered by Mr William David Coolidge, of Schenectady, in the State of New York. The physicians, manj of them X-ray experts, united in declaring that the method will revolutionise the present one of taking radiograph plates and of X-ray treat ment. Dr. Quimby, chief of the X-ra\ .department of the Xew York Poly'clinic Hospital, said it would completely revolutionise that now in use. but one or two years' work would be required to make the application safe in the treatment of disease except in the hands of a skilled expert. The new tube gives X-rays of most remarkable penetrating power and, ii is claimed, is controlled to a degre*. undreamed of when Rotgen made his discovery. It is the result of research conducted in the "laboratories of tin General Electric Company during « period of three years, and utilisesthe principle that certain metals, like platinum, when heated, in. a .vacuum ■give off;-a steam of charged particles. (With the aid of a powerful electric current these partitjk*!?, ,jor ; ,ions,: as galled by scientists, are diiveiu .agaiiist a .p|ate . .placofl • within the vacuum tube,,, ■ -They strilu this and X-rays are produced. 'At Mr Coolidge puts it, "the ions hav( been stewed out of the heated metal," The" penetration of the rays depends upon the speed with which they an driven against the tungsten plate. It was. '■ ■demonstrated, according ti those preseilty that rays were generated powerful enough.t*o ; give fid, •treatuient in fifteen seconds.. . Tin. usual time with the most powerful apparatus is more than .fifteen minutes. Complete destruction of living tissue'may be caused <v an exposure of three minutes, and so remarkable is the control of the production of the rays'by this method that at will the soft tissues of thf body, the veins, and nerves may Oe shown or the densest part of the body may be pictured 10ft. from the tube. i