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Smog & Surge. Occasionally Caltech scientists and engineers come down to earth long enough to worry about such purely practical matters as smog, the effect of wave and surge on harbor installations, the first large-scale testing of hydraulic pumps, and, through their study of the laws of aerodynamics, the design of better airplanes. But the work of Nobel Chemist Linus Pauling is of a more rarefied order. The foremost pioneer in applying the quantum theory to the study of chemical bonds, he found that the "resonance" of the atom is the source of the forces that hold molecules together. He discovered the alpha helix as the fundamental feature of many proteins, went on to explore the architecture of protein, the fundamental substance of living organisms. On the surface, such work often seems remote from practicality, but it has helped chemists find the necessary techniques to create hundreds of new drugs, plastics, synthetic fibers. By unveiling the structure of the hemoglobin molecule, Pauling also revealed the nature of hitherto unrecognized ills, e.g., sickle-cell anemia, and may have laid the foundation for a whole new medical strategy against disease.
As the men of Caltech well know, nature does not give up her secrets easily. There is, says Carl Anderson, no way to see the atom or examine it at first hand. "It must be studied by indirect evidence, and the technical difficulty involved has been compared to asking a man who has never seen a piano to describe a piano from the sound it would make falling downstairs in the dark." But for all the exacting labor, adds Physicist Feynman, "there is a great thrill — a real emotional thrill — when you discover something interesting." The mission of Caltech: to pass on that sense of adventure to the scientists and engineers of the future.
The Big Change. In the last four years. Rodney Supple and John Philip Andelin Jr. of Los Angeles, now seniors, have both caught the spirit of that mission. But they have done so only after going through as tough an ordeal as any under graduate anywhere in the country. In 1951 they were "A" students in their respective high schools, and they had both earned those As with very little effort. Then came the decision to go to Caltech. After that, life was never quite the same.
They did not know it at the time, but they were only two of hundreds of boys (1,200 a year) who also had the necessary credits in mathematics, physics and chemistry to apply for the institute. As it does each year, Caltech picked those with the top academic records, then sent out a team of professors to interview them. The professor who talked to Supple kept asking him why he wanted to be an engineer. He also spoke to Supple's teachers, tried to find out whether the boy was really curious, or merely out for marks. Caltech has good reason for such probing: unless a student wants to be an engineer or a scientist with all his heart, he will simply not get through.