PHYSICS IN INDUSTRY

THE ROLE OF THE PHYSICIST IN THE GLASS INDUSTRY

I. I. Kitaigorodsky, Moscow

One of the scientific directors of the research laboratories of the American firm Corning Glass Works, which is highly advanced technically, Dr. E. Sullivan, in 1937 published in a number of American journals (Glass Industry, J. Applied Physics) an article in which he essentially described his creative work at glass factories in America and showed what an enormous field of activity the glass industry offers physicists. A translation of this article appears in this same issue of the journal.

The article describes particular episodes from the author’s activity connected with the highly successful solution of a number of technical problems of enormous importance not only for the glass industry, but also for science, as well as for the entire economy of the USA.

This article is of undoubted interest to us, especially in light of the tasks that we must solve in the coming years. At the same time, the article shows that our glass industry, which only recently, in terms of its technical level, occupied one of the last places, has over the course of two five-year plans made great advances, having mastered a whole series of new productions about which Sullivan writes in detail in his article. Thus, for example:

1. Mullite electrolite refractory, possessing very valuable properties, is now also being produced in our country at the plant in Yerevan. The production of this refractory has been organized here, as have a number of other new productions, without any foreign technical assistance, on the initiative of Engineer A. A. Litvakovsky and with the closest participation of Prof. A. A. Ginzberg.

2. The production of glass and bulbs for electric lamps has also been firmly organized in our Union, and in this field we freed ourselves from foreign dependence many years ago. As early as 1922 the author of these lines succeeded in developing glass compositions and setting up their production at our glass factories; these were in no way inferior to the best foreign ones.

3. The production of thermally resistant glasses of the Pyrex type has likewise been mastered in our Union in recent years at a number of glass factories.

4. A glass composition replacing lead glass and making it possible

to melt this glass in tank furnaces, about which Sulliven writes, was likewise developed by us, and such glass has already been melted under factory conditions for several years (Moscow Plant, Zaprudnya Plant).

1. Colored signal glasses for traffic lights, Fresnel lenses—green, yellow, ruby-red—about which Sulliven reports in detail, and without which automatic blocking on railways and the safe acceleration of train movement and increase of their carrying capacity are truly impossible, were put into production in 1932–1934 also in our Union. The collective of scientific workers of the Glass Institute under my direction, having solved this most difficult problem (the degree of difficulty of which is especially emphasized by Sulliven), in a very short time freed our country from dependence on foreign sources and saved, in 1933 alone, according to a certificate of the NKPS, about 1,000,000 rubles in gold on imports. At present the production of Fresnel lenses has been fully mastered as a routine matter at the glass plants of the Union. The production of red ruby glass for the Kremlin stars was easily accomplished on the basis of mastering the production of selenium ruby in the Union.

It should be noted that the calculations of the lenses and participation in designing the molds for these lenses were carried out by physicists: Prof. K. N. Yakovlev and L. A. Afanas’ev. Without the participation of physicists it would not have been possible to solve this problem as a whole in a short time.

1. The production of glass insulators of special compositions has not been established in our country, although in 1926 at the “Izolyator” plant experimental work was widely organized and samples were then obtained (breakdown voltage about 100,000 V). The unsuccessful conclusion of the experiments I must now attribute to the fact that physicists were not drawn into this work. This task proved beyond the powers of technologist-chemists alone.

2. In the Union, compositions of colored and colorless glass filters with a definite absorption capacity in the region of visible and invisible rays have also been developed.

The success of this work, carried out by a whole number of researchers (Vargin, Demkina, Dauval’ter, Tsaritsyn, Kitaigorodskii, and others), should be explained by the joint work of chemists and physicists. Unfortunately, certain filters, such as, for example, ultraviolet sheet glass, are not produced here on a broad factory scale.

1. Glass for lighting technology, in particular milk and opal glass with a definite optical characteristic, is manufactured in the Union. The compositions of such glasses, not inferior in optical properties to the best foreign glasses, were likewise developed in the Union.

2. The production of safety glass of the Triplex type and of the Sekorit type has likewise been organized in the Union. Unfortunately, the period of mastering these glasses was at one time somewhat prolonged, since in this case too the technologist-chemists did not make use, to the necessary extent, of the help of physicists. At present work is being carried out

in obtaining glasses of the Securit type, but by an entirely new, original method of his own.

1. The production of optical glass in the Union has been set up quite reliably, and in this field, very important for the national economy and the defense of the Union, we have been completely freed from dependence on foreign countries. The production of optical glass was established in a comparatively short time thanks to the joint work of chemists and physicists: N. N. Kachalov, I. V. Grebenshchikov—chemists, and A. A. Lebedev and others—physicists from the GOI helped Lenkhoz master the necessary grades of optical glass. In Izyum the first successes were achieved in the production of optical glass thanks to the joint work of G. Yu. Zhukovsky—a chemist—and Biske—a physicist.

This example illustrates with sufficient clarity the highly useful joint work of the chemist and the physicist in solving questions connected with obtaining new sorts and types of glass products, or with changing certain technological methods in the glass industry.

And if up to now, in certain points enumerated in Sullivan’s article, we are lagging behind, this is occurring only because the glass industry underestimates the role and importance of the physicist. Thus, for example, we have fallen behind in the production of glass fiber and fabric (experiments are now being conducted at the Glass Institute by Engineer M. G. Chernyak and his co-workers); we have fallen behind in the production of large castings, such as the mirror for the telescope of the California Institute, made at the Corning Glass Works from borosilicate glass and weighing about 20 t. The description of the preparation of this mirror, which testifies to the extremely high level of glass and other technology in the USA, and to the extremely sensible cooperation, in solving complex problems, of representatives of various fields of knowledge (technologists, chemists, physicists, mechanics, heat engineers, electrical engineers, and others), did not leave the pages of American, English, and other specialized journals for the course of a year.

And in fact, the flawless casting of such glass characterizes not only the high American technology in the glass industry, but also a deeply considered organization, efficiency, and foresight in setting up new productions.

What conclusions should we draw from all that has been said above?

1. In the Soviet Union, despite the fact that individual workers of factories and institutes have done much in recent years to master new types of production, the development of glass technology lags behind the American.

2. The reason for the lag is, as a rule, the absence at factories and institutes (the exceptions being the GOI and the optical-glass plants) of cooperative work by chemist-glassmakers with physicists, and an insufficiently skillful organization of work on solving new problems in the glass industry.

3. The plan of the Third Five-Year Plan, which advances the chemical and, consequently, the silicate and glass industries to one of the foremost places, sets before us a number of extremely urgent,

but at the same time technically difficult problem: to overtake the advanced glass technology of the U.S.A. in economic terms.

1. To solve these tasks, it is necessary first of all:

a) to formulate precisely and concretely the tasks and objects of the problems,

b) to skillfully organize the work of research institutes and laboratories,

c) to activate the researchers already at work,

d) and, most important, to enlist physicists first of all for work in the glass industry, giving them the leading role in a whole series of cases.

Among the principal problems that must be solved in the coming years, and that cannot be solved without the participation of physicists, one should list the problems of:

a) the structure of glass, b) reducing the brittleness of glass, c) intensifying the melting and forming of glass, d) the anticorrosion properties of the surface of glass, e) the mechanical processing of glass, f) replacing non-ferrous metals with glass.

In concluding the article, I want to address physicists, and above all young physicists, with an appeal to them to work in the glass industry. Even 10 years ago one could think that the leading role in the glass industry belonged to chemists. Now the line of development of glass technology has taken a different path. Physics has no lesser role in it. Questions of the structure, optics, and mechanics of glass are now everyday questions. Physicists must solve them. For the glass technologist, physicomathematical and physicochemical training is at present more important than classical chemical training. Remarkable horizons and prospects are opening for the creative work of young physicists in the glass industry. Into the glass industry, physicists!