e

Scientists interested
—so are financiers

THE old prospector’s cry of
“There’s gold in them thar
hills,’ has been given a new
twist by modern financiers.--
For them, “‘There’s dividends
in that,thar boron.”

The reason? Whether the
talk among scientific workers
concerns nuclear energy, roc-
ket fuel, high-speed aixcraft,
high octane petrol or agricul-
ture, sooner or later the pos-
sibility of using a boron com-
pound to improve processes or
equipment is discussed.

Boron is an element with
unlimited possibilities for rais-
ing the standard of living —
and making profit!

It was isolated from its
compounds first by Sir Hum-
phrey Davy a little under 150
years ago. He though it was
a metal and called it boracium.
One result is that one of its
compounds is still called bor-
acic acid by the layman. When
Davy realized it was a non-
metal he changed the name
to boron.

The Arabs of old were fami-
liar with the chief source of
boron and they called it buraq
(white and shining). The
modern term borax is derived
from that word.

xt beg xt

A virtual monopoly of the
world’s supply of borax is
owned by a British company,

. Borax Consolidated Ltd. This
company owns huge mines in
the Mojave Desert and Death
Valley in California.

Recently big American fin-
ancial interests, among them
the Rockefeller group, made
overtures to the British com-
pany to let them in on what
could be won from the ex-
ploitation of borax.

The wooing was welcome.
As a foreign firm the British
company could not share in

. the research grants made by

the U.S. government in con-
_ nection with the utilization of
compounds of boron.

And these grants are not
small! For example, already
one $36 million contract has
been let to build a boron hy-
dride fuel plant in Oklahoma,
and another for -10 million has
been let for the erection of a
plant to make sodium boro-
hydride, a raw material for
the manufacture of diborane
which shows promise as a jet
aircraft fuel.

After sitting pretty until-the
money offered by the U.S. in-
terests reached the figure de-
sired, the British company
agreed to form a new company
in which the control would be
shared and which would re-
duce the tax bill of the Brit-
ish shareholders.

% a xt
As a result of work over
the years, compounds of bor-
on are toughening steel and
softening leather; growing
crops (boron is an essential

trace element) and killing
weeds; improving gasoline
(Standard Oil Company is
using boron compounds to give
added power to high compres-
sion engines) and making
paint flameproof.

Much of the contemporary
work on boron is top-secret.
It is known that boron com-
pounds are being examined
as bases for the lubricants
and hydraulic fluids needed
by the. plane that breaks
through the thermal barrier.

The use of boron could

speed the advent of the atom-
powered plane.
Already elemental boron is
being used in -combination
with plastic material as a
shield for atomic reactors. A
boron shield is much lighter
than the other shields of lead
and concrete also used, a fact
that is attractive to aircraft
engineers.

Elemental boron is used in
fuses for rockets and in the
Bell Solar battery, which is
not a battery at all, but a
series of silicon “sandwiches”
which convert the rays of the
sun into electricity.

so iy it

Recently..a fascinating ap-
plication of boron was describ-
ed.

It appears. that when a neu-
tron, a particle emitted by
certain radioactive substances,
hits a boron atom, it releases
an alpha particle which can
kill a nearby animal cell. And
boron offers a big target to
neutrons. The technical term
is “a high tension” cross-sec-
tion.” Eee

Also, when boron is injected
into the blood stream it dif-
fuses readily and rapidly to
all parts of the body except
healthy parts of the brain.
brain “barrier” as it were,
stops it from getting there for
about 20 minutes. It does,
however, enter brain tumors
rapidly.

The idea is then to inject
borax into the system, wait
until the brain barrier has
been set up and the boron
atoms accumulated in the
brain tumor, and then irradi-
cate this with slow thermal
neutrons, These kill off the
tumor cells alongside the place
where the apha particle is
liberated.

There is, it seems from work
done so far, little radiation
damage to the healthy
brain cells. There is still much
work to be done before the
method can be used gener-
ally.

Scientists believe there is
no limit to the uses boron can
be put to. They are greatly
interested in this element and
its compounds.

So, too, are the financiers;
but for different reasons.

SIGN UP THOSE SUBS

Dear Keader:

We now have 248 subs plus 115 paper sale crediis for a total of 363 subs on

our target of 1,060 subs by May Day.
Most Greater Vaneouver press clubs have accepted their 1957 sub objectives

and are trying hard to pick up outstanding renewals. Not that it’s suck a hard
work—it’s mainly a question of getting out and talking to people.

On March 1 at 8 p.m. we are holding a Greater Vancouver
readers’ conference in the lounge room at Pender Auditorium,
339 West Pender Street. Refreshments will be served and all
those readers concerned with improving and promoting their
paper are invited to attend to discuss the question in an informal
atmosphere.

Tom McEwen and I are on the road these weekends, pre-
paring for the annual financial drive. We had a good meeting
with North and South Surrey and Fort Langley supporters, but

bad roads delayed a proposed trip to Haney.

On Friday this week I'll be in Websters Corners, and the following week, we
are off to Vancouver Island. Proposed dates: March 2 — Nanaimo; March 3 ;—
Lake Cowichan and Duncan; March 4 — Victoria; March 5 — readers’ conference
in Nanaimo; March 6 — Port Alberni; March 7 — Cumberland, March 8-9 —

Campbell River.

Rita Whyte

Club standings to February 18

CLUB QUOTA ACHIEVED

GREATER VANCOUVER

Advance =2=-- == 100*
Ae Be smith, = 5-22 = 35
Broadway. SS 100*
Building Trades ------ 45
Diy Dok oe ee 60
East ends ee 40
Electrical __----------- 15
Georgians a ee ee 40
Grandview © =_22---===-- 110*
Hastines East. = == 100*
Kensington ___-------- 90”
Kitsilano; == 15"
Mount Pleasant -_-.--- 65*
Niilo Makela ___------- 40*
NOMguay. 2 15*
Oleing se 25*
Penge Pale ee 10°
Point Grey. —----—----- 5°
Strathcona: = -2- 30"
Victory Square _-_---- 125*
Watertront  <-- = - 40
West) End 2222-2 50*
North Burnaby ___---- 110*
South Burnaby ------- 120*
North Vancouver ------ 100*
North Van. District -_ 80*
City Miscellaneous __-_ 300*

22

10

WZ

50

CLUB QUOTA ACHIEVED
PROVINCE
Aldergrove __*22¢232-2-°15 1
Cranbrook... 2-5 15 aoe
Fernie® 2.2 232-4258 20 2
Fort Langley. <2 == 40* 5
Haney 3-4 40 2
Kamloops © ---2==2.2==- 35 5
Wanner. ee ee 5
Langley, ss 15 1
Maple Ridge --..-.---- 44* 2
Michel-Natal _--------- 35 2
Mission 24 =) = S252. =: 25* 3
Nelson: 2222 75 5
New Westminster --_-___- 90 5
Notch: Hill =. 25 1
Powell River __------- 70 5
Prince; ceorge —-. --_= 20* 3
Steveston: == -- | 10 1
North: Surrey ==°= = -=— 35* v
South Surrey: _--¢-=-=— 30* 1
Trail-Rossland ____---- 100 14
Veron eS 30 A
Correspondence -__----- 25* 3

VANCOUVER ISLAND

Albernis «== ccs 75 ll
Campbell River __-_-- == 260. 1
Conrtenay 222 65 1
Cumberland ___------- 50 3
Cowichan 32: 7 2
Nanaimo = 300 22
Parksville; ¢2 35* 3
Wictoria <2 s.s 5. 175 12

PROVINCE MISCELLANEOUS

Bhitanniay = 15 ee
Copper Mountain -_-_-_- 20 1
Grassy.-Plains ._- <= 10 ae
Prince Rupert ____---- 15 1
Salmon Arm --_----_-- 15* 1
Sointulas =) 2.2 oe 45 4
Others =. . 2. ee ee 200 18

@ Please note: These are only proposed annual quotas for 1957. Those

denoted by an asterisk have been accepted by press clubs.

FEBRUARY 22, 1957 — PACIFIC TRIBUNE—PAGE 12