Abstract
THE author has produced an interesting and well-written book which gives a good historical account of the development of artificial lighting; particular attention being given to incandescent lighting. A chapter is devoted to the growth of the rare earth industry. The dramatic discovery of rich deposits of monazite in the British Empire, and notably at Travancore in India during the War, was a great help to this country; the sands at Travancore contain more than 45 per cent. of monazite. The processes of extracting pure thorium compounds from monazite demand great ingenuity, and they are well described. Descriptions are also given of the recent great improvements in the manufacture of incandescent mantles. The author gives a very fair comparison of the costs of oil, gas, and electric methods of lighting. The average candle-power (formerly called the mean spherical candle-power) should, however, have been taken as the basis of the comparison and not the mean horizontal candle-power.
Incandescent Lighting.
S. I.
Levy
By. (Pitman's Common Commodities and Industries.) Pp. x + 129. (London: Sir Isaac Pitman and Sons, Ltd., 1922.) 3s. net.
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Incandescent Lighting. Nature 111, 392 (1923). https://doi.org/10.1038/111392a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/111392a0