The Occurrence of Helium and Neon in Vacuum Tubes

Abstract

A SHORT time ago we published (Proc. Roy. Soc., A, 109, 186, 1925) an account of some attempts to confirm the observations by Collie, Patterson, and Masson (ibid. 91, 30, 1915) of the occurrence of helium and neon in vacuum tubes. In view of the fact that we were able to obtain small quantities of these rare gases by passing the discharge through oxygen at low pressures when a magnesium or aluminium anticathode coated with nitride was used, no trace being found in the absence of the nitride, we attributed their formation to the disintegration of the nitrogen atom. Success depended on the use of an induction coil provided with a hammer break rather than a mercury break, an observation which agrees with those made by the previous authors.