In the Lynn works of the General Electric Company, has been produced a substance known as a clear fused quartz, which possesses an astonishing catalog of uses and properties:
1.) It is the most transparent solid known, transmitting 92% of the light passed through a meter rod of it. The best optical glass transmits 65%; ordinary glass 35%.
2.) It transmits all the rays of the sunlight, including the ultraviolet and infrared, which are cut out by ordinary glass. Owing to this property it is expected to be of great value to medicine. By it diseased areas of the throat, nose, ears, stomach, hitherto inaccessible cavities, may be subjected to the action of these germicidal rays, as well as to heat. A sun-room made of fused quartz panes would have the same effect as sunlight in the open air. A quartz lamp will give a healthy sunburn.
3.) It is a perfect conductor of light. Light from a match or pocket flash at one end of a fused quartz rod 25 feet long passed through the tube without appreciable loss of illumination. Further, the light travels intact through bent and twisted tubes, around corners, no matter how long or devious the way, just as a hose carries water.
4.) It is a perfect heat transmitter, remaining cool on the surface while the heat rays pass through a tube of it undiminished.
5.) It has the lowest expansion ratio of any solid known. A tube of it one yard long, heated to 3,200 degrees Fahrenheit, increased but 1/50 inch in length. Platinum increases 1/3 inch when subjected to the same heat, and copper 3/5 inch. President S.W. Stratton, of M.I. T., former director of the Bureau of Standards, believes that all standards of length will now be made of fused quartz instead of platinum.
6.) It possesses extraordinary ductility and elasticity. A rod or tube of it, bent or twisted from its normal position, will return to its former shape when released, without setting permanently. It can be made to assume any desired shape.
7.) It is unaffected by sudden changes in temperature, can be welded without risk, and may be used for chemical beakers, thermometers, motion picture projection lenses or other apparatuses where glass is subject to intense heat, eliminating much costly breakage.
8.) It will be of very great importance in the manufacture of lenses for optical instruments, especially cinema, photographic, and astronomical. It may add materially to the efficiency of the best existing telescopes.