Ultra-Nucleonics

To really advanced physicists, nuclear fission is old, dull stuff. What excites them now is "ultra-nucleonics," study of "the elementary particles within the atom which are capable of releasing thousands of times as much energy as is produced by the nuclear fission on which the A-bomb is based." To these men, trained in the esoteric mysteries of quantum mechanics, all matter is merely condensed energy. It is formed by the interaction of waves, and to waves it can return. What a triumph it would be, they speculate, to turn matter all at once into waves of energy.

Role of the Meson. Last week 500 ultra-physicists gathered in Manhattan at a meeting of the American Physical Society to discuss this unfinished business. The meson (pronounced mees-on) was the star of the convention. Most physicists agreed that this subatomic particle, which weighs 200 times as much as an electron, was the key to the problem.

Little is definitely known about mesons, except that they are formed in large numbers in the upper atmosphere. One theory: cosmic rays hit air atoms, knock high-speed protons out of their nuclei. These hit other atomic nuclei, somehow producing mesons. Mesons live only two-millionths of a second; then they disintegrate with a burst of energy. All, or nearly all, the matter in.the meson spontaneously turns into energy. If physicists could generate mesons on a large scale, their great problem might be solved.

The only reliable meson generators are the mysterious cosmic rays from outer space, which spend most of their force inconveniently high in the atmosphere.

V-2 Report. Luckily for the ultra-physicists, the U.S. Army, hell-bent for high-altitude guided missiles, was cooperating. Last week the Army told good news. A German V-2 rocket, roaring 100 miles above New Mexico, had carried elaborate instruments to the realm of the cosmic rays. Twenty miles up, the effect of the rays was 300 times as strong as on the earth; 20 miles higher it fell off again.

The V-2's report gave a cross section view of almost the entire atmosphere. At the top it showed the original cosmic rays, but comparatively few in number. Lower down, they had smacked into atoms, set swarming particles flying. Lower still, their effect had largely died away.

The data would be studied with bated breath, would yield new understanding of the birth of mesons. Eventually, perhaps, the grateful physicists might repay the Army with a cataclysmic meson-bomb.

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