Nikola Tesla's Experiments - Exposure to X Rays - Messages By Electrical Waves

The great length of tin.e required for the exposure of objects to the X rays before satisfactory impressions could be obtained on the sensitized plates has hitherto proved a source of considerable trouble to solontists who have experimented with the new radiance. When operations were first begun in this country with the rays, an exposure of from two to three hours was often found necessary. To a large extent this fact was due to a paucity in the supply of good tubes. Gradually the experimenters improved their apparatus, by the importation, principally, of Crookes tubes, but even with the best vacuum tube that could be got in this way, exposures of from twenty to forty minutes were essential. Consequently, it is obvious, the discovery of a method for the perfection of the apparatus, whereby results could be obtained with more rapidity, would be of especial value and importance, particularly in the treatment of surgical bases.

It is interesting, therefore, to know that Nikola Tesla, the New-York scientist and electrician, has succeeded in taking photographs of various objects, including the bones of the hand, in the actual time of one second. To a Tribune reporter, who saw him yesterday at his laboratory, No. 46 East Houston-st., Mr. Tesla said that this result was due primarily to exceedingly high vacuum tubes, considerably higher in fact than the best Crookes tubes. Mr Tosla said he had exhausted the bulbs himself by electricity. He was also able, he said, with these tubes, to photograph articles at a distance of forty feet. Mr. Tesla was not inclined to make public the details of his method for making the tubes, although, he said, he had communicated his principles to several scientists, who had written testifying to the value of the bulbs in experiments with the X rays.

Speaking of the report that he was engaged in the development of an instrument for communicating with the nearer planets, and for conveying messages from one centre to another without wires, by means of electrical waves, Mr. Tesla said; "To say that I am developing an instrument to communicate with the planets is, to say the least, somewhat premature. But by electrical disturbances which will act upon my instrument I am confident that I shall be able to signal all parts of the earth instantaneously. In an address which I gave some few years ago to a scientifio audience, I demonstrated that it would be possible to use the elegtricity in the atmosphere and the earth for lighting. and heating and for, communication with distant parts of the earth. The problem of conserving this electrical energy I am now at work upon, and by the aid of the apparatus I have made I am confident that we shall be able to get all the electrical energy we want from the atmosphere. The present methods of generating electricity would in that event become a thing of the past. This electric envelope of the earth will enable us to send messages to all parts of the world instantly, and, in the belief that this electrical fluid is not confined to this atmosphere, I think it is possible that we may be able to use is to communicate with other planets.