acs to build new headquarters

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MEETING HIGHLIGHTS 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 Original Plutonium Process 73 Carbohydrates Plus Hydrocarbon Give New Chemicals 84 More Heat Stability Coming for Carbon Black Polyethylene 86 Mites and Aphids—Niagara Readies Two Chemi- cals 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 New Headquarters • New building on present site in Washington to give nearly four times present space, cost $3 million • Test for potential alconolics to come soon, says Roger Williams in ACS presidential address 132 ACS NATIONAL MEETING Advancing Chemical Front OIG NEWS of the chemical world this week is the new headquarters building that the AMERICAN CHEMICAL SOCIEXY will erect in Washington. Announce- ment 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. The new building, to be put up on the site of ACS headquarters, will re- place the present five-story building with a modern, eight-story office build- ing. This is the maximum height al- lowed by Washington zoning regula- tions. 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&EN 25

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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