acs to build new headquarters
TRANSCRIPT
M E E T I N G H I G H L I G H T S
One Step, High Yield—That's Pfizer's New
Steroid Route 66
Polyethylene Ethers Key to New Borazine Process 67
New Plant Growth Chemicals Stir Industry . . . 5 67
Time Was Important in the Or ig ina l Plutonium Process 73
Carbohydrates Plus Hydrocarbon Give New Chemicals 84
More Heat Stabil i ty Coming for Carbon Black Polyethylene 86
Mites and Aph ids—Niagara Readies Two Chemicals for the Fight 87
Formulation and Fabrication—The Answers to Polyethylene Stress Cracking 98
Seniors Learn the Literature at Bradford Durfee . 137
ACS to Build N e w Headquarters
• New bui lding on present site in Washington to give near ly four times present space, cost $3 mill ion
• Test for potential alconolics t o come soon, says Roger Wi l l iams in ACS presidential address
132 ACS NATIONAL MEETING
Advancing Chemical
Front
O I G NEWS of the chemical world this week is the new headquarters building that the AMERICAN CHEMICAL SOCIEXY
will erect in Washington. Announcement of plans for the building by ACS Board Chairman Ralph Connor at the Society's Council meeting on Tuesday morning set the corridors abuzz at the
'Society's 132nd meeting in New York. T h e new building, to be put up on
the site of ACS headquarters, will replace the present five-story building with a modern, eight-story office building. This is the maximum height allowed by Washington zoning regulations. Floor *space will be 80,000
square feet, nearly four times present useable space and more than twice the area now needed. At foreseeable rate of growth of chemistry and of ACS services to the profession, the new building should serve for 20 years, says Connor. Excess space will be rented until needed.
SEPT. 16, 1957 C & E N 2 5
EMPLOYERS A - L
One of the youngest coauthors on the New York program was 14-year-old Brenda Kanegis, of Hyattsville Junior High School in Maryland. With her father, James Kanegis (left), U. S. Department of Commerce, and Boger Gilmont, Manostat Corp., she prepared a report on using glycerol to speed up cooking of foods
What about a job? As usual, the Employment Clearing House drew heavy attendance at New York
Where are they? With heavy registration, staff members rush to keep the Kardex current
Phi Lambda Upsilon, honorary chemical fraternity presented honorary memberships to four distinguished chemists at a luncheon during the New York ACS meeting. Shown
here with fraternity president Carl S. Carlson (left and far right) of Esso, they are (left to right) Conrad A. Elvehjem, Wallace R. Brode, Louis F. Fieser, and W. A. Noyes, Jr.
2 6 C & E N SEPT. 16, 1957
New York's Manhattan Center was the scene of Monday night's general meeting and Roger Williams' presidential
address. Afterwards, members adjourned to the Statler for the Mixer. Registration passed 12,000 by midweek
The building will cost $3 million. A campaign to raise funds will give every member—and industry—an opportunity to contribute. Details of the campaign are being worked out, according to Connor.
The decision to rebuild in Washington came after four years of study by the ACS Board of Directors. Key to the decision is exemption from real estate taxes that the ACS enjoys in the District of Columbia. This puts the cost of owning its building lower than renting. (For full text of Connor's report, see page 121.)
The Council session came on the second day of the largest meeting ever held by the ACS. A record total of 1509 papers was scheduled for the 211 half-day sessions of the Society's 22 divisions. Registration early in the week ran well ahead of records set at the last New York meeting in 1954 when attendance reached 13,500.
• President's Address. A way to spot potential alcoholics may come soon, predicted ACS President Roger J. Williams in his presidential address on Monday evening. Describing his work on biochemical individuality, Williams said that h e has found several "earmarks" or tests for potential alcoholics which can be applied to youngsters. He hopes to have these results ready for publication soon.
Director of the Biochemical insti
tu te of the University of Texas, Williams bases this prediction on evidence that alcoholism is related to nutrition. This he has proved with animals. In tests with humans, many alcoholics have benefited remarkably, and some have had their lives completely transformed, observes Williams. But experiments in this area have a long way to go, and opportunities for advance have by no means been exhausted. "By recognizing potential alcoholics early and watching and adjusting their nutrition, we are confident that alcoholism can be prevented," he concludes.
His work on alcoholism and biochemical individuality Williams describes as "scientific fiddling/' which he defends against those who may turn up their noses at anything that falls short of the ultimate in sophist icated "highbrow" investigation. "There remain even yet so many simple questions to which we do not know the answers that I think there will be room for fiddlers research for many years to come."
TH€ COVER: The ACS gets set fo r a new, eight-story headquarters building in Washington. This is the architect's sketch of the proposed building.
(For full text of Williams' address, "Fiddlers ' Dreams," see pages 116-20.)
Fifteen new names were added to the growing list of winners of ACS-sponsored awards at the general meeting on Monday evening (see pages 152-3 ) . The awards, announced by President Williams, will be presented at the 133rd ACS meeting in San Francisco next spring.
Also announced at the general meeting were public relations awards to local sections. Philadelphia won the award for the large sections, South Jersey for the middle sections. Southeast Pennsylvania is third-time winner of the medium sections award, while Idaho won in the small sections group.
Get t ing Through to the Public
The publ ic doesn't know as much about chemists and chemical engineers as it does about the chemical industry. And it doesn't know nearly enough about t he industry, says Daniel J. For-restal, manager of public relations for Monsanto. Even people within the chemical industry itself are not aware of what technical people are like—their attitude and philosophy, for example.
As an "early-morning" step to change this picture via public relations, For-restal (who is also president of Public Relations Society of America) told the
S E P T . 16, 1 9 5 7 C & E N 2 7
INDUSTRY & BUSINESS
Integration is the trend in the special metals industry. Agreeing on the formation and announcement of Mallory-Sharon Metals are Joseph E. Cain, president of P. R. Mallory; Wilbur T . Blair, vp-treas. of Sharon Steel; John E . Bierwirth, president of National Distillers; and James A. Romer, president of the new firm
Titanium Makers Tighten Belts Cutbacks bring retrenching; National Distillers and Mallory-Sharon move to Ti-Zr integration
ACS News Service breakfast that local sections can help this way:
• Find out who will spread the word. Usually, corporation and school public relations people are glad to cooperate.
• Name local section public relations chairmen a year in advance
• Outline a year's public relations program selectively
• Get t he outline checked out by a public relations pro
• Ask for advice and help on things like press contacts, awards, and radio and TV-programs, and key the section's whole plant to capitalize on existing section programs.
Link Between Diet, Hear t Disease
Many researchers believe that a direct relation may exist between fat intake in the diet and coronary heart disease ^atherosclerosis). This hypothesis, says Jules Hirsch of Rockefeller Institute, is supported by many types of reasoning. However, as he pointed out at the Division of Agricultural and Food Chemistry luncheon, "Other considerations cause one to be wary and to call the hypothesis extremely important b u t as yet unproved/ '
According to one widely held theory, a peculiarity in dietary fat produces an abnormality of the blood lipides. As a result, these lipides are deposited out on the artery walls and eventually cause coronary heart disease.
This hypothesis, says Hirsch, has a number of strong points. For one thing, the material found in the artery wall deposits contains the same types of lipides as those in the blood serum and in t h e diet.
Animal experiments also support the basic hypothesis. Feeding cholesterol to rabbits increases their serum chloes-terol and promotes atherosclerosis. The lesions found in rabbits are remarkably similar to those in human atherosclerosis, although not precisely the same.
Work at Rockefeller Institute and elsewhere indicates that when a vegetable fat substitutes for an animal one, serum levels of cholesterol and phos-pho-lipides promptly decrease. This is caused by the triglyceride itself rather than by the unsaponifiable material in the fat. The unsaturation and chain length of the triglyceride fatty acids are the important factors involved in the observed changes in serum cholesterol and phospholipides, says Hirsch.
. F INANCIAL NEWSLETTERS this week
are again down on titanium producers. No doubt remains that recent aircraft cutbacks and limited present-day commercial markets make for a poor short-term future, when any one of the foui major titanium fabricators can almost handle the total market himself. But don't write the industry off. It's not dead.
National Distillers and Mallory-Sharon took the first step as they fully integrated titanium-zirconium facilities (C&EN, Sept. 9, page 7 ) . The new Mallory-Sharon Metals, with more than $55 million in assets, will be born officially on Nov. 1. Stock is equally owned by P. R. Mallory, Sharon Steel, and National Distillers; in addition, Distillers gets $12.5 million in debentures.
In return, the new company takes
over Distillers' titanium and ziicoxiium-hafnium producing plants and laboratories. The zirconium plant goes on-stream this month, titanium by year-end. Also for Mallory-Sharon Metals: full ownership of Reactive Metals (now equally held by Distillers and t t ie old Mallory-Sharon), plus exclusive and royalty-free use of Distillers' sodium reduction process, said to be cheapest metal sponge production method- Distillers is now taking a long look at niobium and tantalum—planning pilot plant output at Cincinnati around March 1958. Officials feel tha t any switch to gas-cooled nuclear reactors will spur niobium's use. Production will shift to Mallory-Sharon IVIetals when it becomes large volume.
W h a t does the integration mean to the industry? In zirconium, M[allory-Sharon Metals will be the only com-
2 8 C & E N SEPT. 16, 1957