Letters: Open and shut
I was a little surprised by last week’s ‘Long-lived reactors’ report,
which stated that five Nuclear Electric Magnox stations were shut down last
year, and then given permission to reopen (In Brief, 11 January).
Four of them, of course, didn’t close down at all, and are still reliably
generating at high load factors. We have every confidence that we will still
be generating Magnox electricity beyond the turn of the century.
The fifth, Trawsfynydd, remains shut down while Nuclear Electric finalises
a safety case which is expected to support operation to at least 30 years
(1995).
Doug McRoberts Nuclear Electric, Gloucester
Letters: Cisterns analysts
Thomas Crapper’s admirable valveless water waste system (Letters, 14
December, 4 and 18 January) now needs following up in the country’s Gents.
Most urinals are programmed to flush approximately 9 litres of clean
water every 15 minutes from a storage cistern seven days a week, thereby
using 300 000 litres a year at a cost of approximately 拢1 per 1000
litres, or 拢300 per urinal per annum. There are some 2.5 million
urinals merrily flushing away at this rate and only those installed since
April 1989 need to have control valves under the Water Bylaws.
The installation and maintenance of an electronic infrared monitor activating
a solenoid valve in the feeder pipe can reduce the waste by 80 per cent,
yet still maintain hygienic conditions and conform to the bylaws.
Simple cistern dams installed in each wc can effect further savings
while maintaining an adequate flush.
Premises managers of the world unite! You have nothing to change but
your loos! And you would save the nation 拢600 million a year.
P. L. G. Bateman Rentokil, West Sussex
Letters: Exploding eggs
I am not fond of a sunny side on my fried eggs, so I always invert them
gingerly in the frying pan when they are half cooked. Despite my best efforts,
I sometimes rupture the yolks, an irritating occurrence which makes me assume
that the yolk membrane has a very low tensile strength. I was therefore
surprised to read (The Independent, 7 January) that two women had been treated
at the Birmingham and Midland Eye Hospital for burns to their eyelids, corneas
and conjunctivas caused by separate explosions of egg yolks which were pierced
with forks after having been heated in a microwave oven for one minute.
The doctors reported that the pressure and temperature of the intact yolk
sacs had risen sufficiently to cause the subsequent explosions. Happily,
both women have recovered fully.
Can it really be that this fragile membrane can withstand such a high
pressure within? Might it be that for some reason, ‘super-heated’ water
within the yolk boils spontaneously when the membrane is punctured? Perhaps
other readers may be able to explain this culinary hazard more satisfactorily.
Graham Mounsey Exeter, Devon.
Letters: Holy evolutionist
The text from Genesis cited by A. Wathelet (Letters, 4 January) is one
that I, too, have often thought about. Given (as I understand) that the
skeletons of most snakes do have rudimentary limbs, I have often speculated
that the author of Genesis was an acute observer, and possibly the first
to advance a theory of evolution.
Alan Batten National Research Council Victoria, Canada
Letters: Sex mitten
On reading your Christmas issue, I felt a twinge of sympathy for the
Chelmsford choirboy who invented a gimballed candle-holder, only to find
that some naval smartarse had patented the same at the time of Nelson (Technology,
21/28 December).
When I turned over to the Patents page, I felt a surge of self-centred
rage at the item on someone who thinks he invented a two-handed glove for
hand-holding lovers. I invented this device in 1958 so that my boyfriend
(as we called them in those quaint old-fashioned days) and I could wander
together round Leeds University without getting our hands cold. It consisted
of a knitted bag, with two separate cuffs, large enough to hold two intertwined
hands, and was known as the ‘sex mitten’ by our friends. Unfortunately,
at the time, I was too starry-eyed to think of patenting this novel garment,
and now it is too late.
Angela Kingston Leeds
Letters: Corroding cakes
Like your technology editor, we like a fortified cake (Feedback, 11
January). Each year we mature our Christmas cake for about a month with
a liberal dressing of sherry and brandy (50/50). This season we must have
been particularly liberal with the liquor since some seeped out of the kitchen
foil in which the cake was wrapped, into the bottom of the storage tin.
The result was a fine example of electrolytic corrosion, with an aluminium
foil anode and a zinc/iron cathode. The electrolyte was spirits with salts
from the cake. The aluminium foil was corroded into numerous holes and the
base of the cake was thus contaminated with dissolved aluminium salts.
The general lesson from this experience is: if you do not wish to ingest
aluminium do not leave moist food in contact with aluminium together with
any other metal container or implement. If any corrosion takes place the
aluminium will be preferentially dissolved.
Victor Iutz Isle of Arran, Scotland
Letters: Yukky water
Julie Johnson’s article about how microwave ovens fail to bring out
the flavour of food was interesting (New 杏吧原创, Science, 18 January).
I would like to know what microwaves do to plain tap water. I have tried
once or twice to make a cup of tea with a microwave when a kettle was not
available. I heated water in the cup until it boiled and added a teabag
as normal. The tea was revolting, and nothing like tea made using an electric
kettle or a saucepan. What were the microwaves doing to the water?
Beth Grear Grantham Lincolnshire
Letters: Correction
In our Christmas issue, molluscs were wrongly described as a ‘family’
(Science, 21/28 December). In fact, they constitute a phylum, not a family.
Letters: Zoo experience
Your leader severely criticises the role of David Jones at London Zoo
(Comment, 18 January). I consider that these comments and their implications
are unfair and misplaced. The present and past members of the Zoo’s Council
(and I am one of them) must share full responsibility for the Zoo’s past
affairs whilst we make renewed efforts to save it.
I expect your readers have a good idea of the Zoo’s ups and downs in
the post-war period. It was buoyed up by occasional generous private donations
and valuable but irregular support from the government, but the Zoo continued
to suffer drastic increases in costs and essential maintenance fell into
abeyance. In the 1980s, far-reaching efforts were made to correct this state
of affairs and it was coincidental that Jones was in his post at that time.
Those running the zoo had to explore a number of possible developments.
The Zoo has an option to expand into an extra 10 acres of Regent’s Park
and it was correct to consider whether this could be done. It was also right,
indeed made necessary at Government behest, to make serious proposals for
commercial involvement and development.
Many of us, I am sure David Jones included, had misgivings at the implications
of these developments, but it would have been totally inappropriate for
him to have relinquished his participation at that critical time. Whilst
it is true that he was a member of the management team, it was the policy
of the then-existing team that eventually led to the present crisis and
the Zoo’s General Director had to have the courage to explore the possibilities.
I have seen London Zoo develop from a place that was solely concerned
with its own exhibitions into a leading centre for wild animal research,
followed by development into a world leader in the veterinary care of wild
animals. Currently, captive breeding and overseas programmes are high on
the Zoo’s agenda. Jones must be accorded great credit for these excellent
developments.
P. A. Jewell Zoological Society of London
Letters: Draughty homes
Your correspondent Crispin Aubrey, paints a stark picture of the premature
– and avoidable – deaths in the UK which result from cold weather (Forum,
4 January). His solution to fuel poverty, ‘to invest in energy efficiency’
in order to ‘bring each home up to the insulation standards of the 1990
Building Regulations’, may be less successful than it would appear at first
sight.
Independent tests by SGS Yarsley (‘An investigation into actual heat
loss through cavity wall constructions’, June 1991, published by Eurisol)
show significant discrepancies between the ‘U’ (heat transfer) values calculated
for Building Regulation purposes and true ‘U’ values. This is particularly
true for some modern methods of construction where actual heat losses through
cavity walls may be 50 per cent greater than calculated Building Regulations
should allow.
One can only applaud any measures to improve insulation standards –
whether on new construction or to upgrade the existing housing stock. Until
something is done about the significant discrepancy between calculated and
true heat losses under current Building Regulations, they are no standard
to which anyone should aspire.
A simple revision to the Approved Document L of Building Regulations
is all that would be needed to ensure that current ‘U’ values are calculated
on a more realistic basis. The Department of the Environment could – at
a stroke – bring to an end this legacy of energy-inefficient housing which
neither the nation nor the (wider) environment can afford.
I. S. Knight Eurisol (UK Mineral Wool Association) Hertfordshire
Letters: Jobless graduates
I am writing on behalf of unemployed science graduates who feel they
have been let down by the hierarchy of the science establishment in the
UK.
I graduated from the University of Dundee obtaining a 2(i) honours degree
in biochemistry. Having been accepted to study for a PhD at the University
of Glasgow, I learned that the Science and Engineering Research Council
would not finance me because I was born in Northern Ireland. I then applied
for a maintenance grant from the Department of Education for Northern Ireland.
Much to my surprise, and that of my supervisor, they also turned down my
application for a grant as only 25 grants were available to study science
and technology at a postgraduate level outside Northern Ireland.
Since then I have been applying for research assistantship posts, but
am finding, like many of my contemporaries, that life as a graduate is not
a bed of roses. I find myself in a catch-22 situation: without experience
I cannot get a job and without a job I cannot get experience. I am continuing
to apply for jobs and am still reasonably optimistic that I will land on
my feet and get a job in science, but I fear like many of my contemporaries
I may be forced into a career outside science which would be very sad indeed.
Patrick Trotter Belfast, Northern Ireland
Letters: Jobless graduates
With uncanny timing in view of your article on postgraduate poverty
(Forum, 18 January), the Science and Engineering Research Council and the
Natural Environment Research Council have both announced, within the last
fortnight, ‘an interim increase’ in the maintenance grant for postgraduate
students, from 拢4125 to 拢4300 per annum. This rise will take
effect in April at which time the research councils will indicate the rates
to be paid from 1 October 1992. This is the date on which a new batch of
fresh-faced students will begin their scientific research careers, replacing
these newly-qualified PhDs who will attempt to move on to the next phase
of theirs, namely the quest for solvency which they were denied during the
course of their studentships.
It is to be hoped that the research councils, and indeed the Minister
for Science and Higher Education, realise within the next three months that
the prospect of living on just 拢82.69 a week is hardly an incentive
for the nation’s potential young scientists.
Bob Ward University of Manchester
Letters: Drug problem
In ‘Over the edge: stress and schizophrenia’ (4 January), Julian Leff
displays a not so subtle bias when he writes, ‘the relatively poor outcome
of patients in the West occurs despite the fact that a high proportion are
kept on antipsychotic drugs indefinitely.’ A less biased view might be that
the poor outcome occurs because they are kept on such drugs. In their 1976
review in the American Journal of Psychiatry entitled ‘Maintenance Antipsychotic
Therapy: Is the Cure Worse than The Disease?’, Gardos and Cole remark that
as many as 50 per cent of those on such drugs ‘would not be worse off without
them’. After reviewing the literature myself I think that a lot more of
them would be better off without the inevitable iatrogenic disease caused
by such drugs.
M. J. C. Brown Northwood, Middlesex
Letters: The sleepy eater
I read Mr Horne’s article ‘Stay awake, stay alive’ (4 January) with
considerable interest – and disappointment. The author ignored one very
important factor, namely food intake. Anyone that has spent a drowsy Christmas
weighed down by the traditional vast dinner will know what I mean.
I had considerable personal experience of long-distance driving during
one period of about three years when I drove a light truck from Sydney to
Tamworth and back every second weekend. This was mainly at night, partly
because I could not waste working time, partly because driving in the hot
Australian sun is extremely tiring (and there’s another factor for you).
Early in this period, I learned about the effects of sugar and adrenalin
on wakefulness. I realised that I had been battling with sleep from around
the 300 kilometre mark because of eating a normal dinner before setting
off. After I changed to eating a light snack of salad and bread before a
trip, the problem virtually vanished.
As I became more familiar with the road and boredom set in, especially
on the New England Highway, which is smooth, wide and relatively straight,
the problem reappeared. I decided to apply a moderate intake of cane sugar
in order keep my blood sugar up. I found by experimentation over some weeks
that one boiled sweet or candy every 25 kilometres was the minimum to maintain
complete wakefulness. No doubt the added interest of watching the odometer
helped . . .
This method may have side effects, but what would you rather be, slim
or alive?
Jan Wikstrom Port Melbourne, Australia
Letters: Crescent Sun
I read Bradley Schaefer’s interesting article on the origin of the star
and crescent in Islam (‘Heavenly signs’, 21/28 December) on my way home
from viewing the annular eclipse of the Sun that was visible from San Diego,
California, on 4 January. At such annular eclipses, the Moon’s disc is smaller
than the Sun’s, so an annulus of bright sunlight remains visible when the
Moon is centred on the Sun. In the minutes before annularity the solar crescent
takes on the appearance of the Islamic symbol. At an annular eclipse, the
inner edge of the visible crescent has a smaller radius of curvature than
the outer edge, matching the shape of the Islamic crescent better than a
crescent Moon does. Also, the solar crescent before annularity can match
the more-than-halfway-around crescent of Islam, which an actual lunar crescent
never can.
Dr Schaefer shows that the origin of the star-and-crescent symbol is
lost in antiquity prior to 2500 BC. An annular eclipse seen near sunset,
as the 4 January 1992 eclipse was, could have been visible to the naked
eye. The striking appearance of the crescent Sun could well have been so
memorable that it led to the symbol still in use today.
Jay M. Pasachoff Hopkins Observatory Williamstown Massachusetts US