Chapter 17

     Kean takes a more comic approach with this chapter's title: "Spheres of Splendor: The Science of Bubbles." Kean states that bubbles had often been seen as something for children, unimportant to scientists. However, this would come to change due to a man named Donald Glaser. One day at a bar, he was watching the foam on top of his drink. Legend has it that, after finishing his drink, he had an entire experiment planned in which he would implement his new creation, the bubble chamber. Scientists want to believe in this story, but in truth Glaser created the bubble chamber through experimentation in a lab. Kean comically states that Glaser decided that the best liquid to utilize in his bubble chamber was beer, and not liquid hydrogen, "for Lord knows what reason." The beer experiments flopped and his lab partners disliked the smell left by the ale after it was vaporized. Luis Alvarez would later decide that liquid hydrogen was, quite astonishingly, the best liquid for them to use. Glaser would be among the fifteen scientists on the 1960's Time magazine Men of the Year cover. He would also win a Nobel Prize at the age of thirty three, incredibly young for a winner, and would borrow McMillan and Segrè's white vest for that ceremony, as he had moved to Berkeley.
      Kean then goes on to give a brief history of bubbles. He identifies calcium as the elements most notable for forming bubbles and foams. He mentions how spongy bone is tough, yet light, and how NASA uses foam to protect shuttles on reentry. Calcium rocks such as marble and limestone are used by ancient sculptors, and the chemical recation between rainwater and calcium creates caves. Beyond that, Kean states that the calcium-rich coves on the southern coast of England are strongly tied to the history of the area and humanity's effect on geography. They were originally limestone quarries, the Romans arrived and stripped it of its limestone and then the English themselves took more limestone to build things such as the Tower of London. The caverns left behind would be used by pirates smuggling French goods to England due to an English tax on French goods meant to spite the French government and Napoleon. England's incompetence in the field of stopping smugglers led them to establish free trade and made England economically prosperous.
     Kean talks about a scientist named Ernest Rutherford. Rutherford built on Marie Curie's work and suspected that "pure radioactivity" was an undiscovered element. He drew bubbles off the gas created by a decaying active sample into an inverted flask and he and his partner proved that the bubbles were a new element. The method they used to discover this new element, radon, brought to light new rules that allowed scientists to move across the periodic table with ease. They had essentially discovered a scientifically accurate form of alchemy and transmutation. Even later, Rutherford would learn how to estimate the age of a radioactive rock by the bubbles inside of it. This paved the way for scientists to make later educated guesses in regards to the age of the Earth, and maybe even the universe.
     I liked Kean's storytelling prowess, which never fails to make a chapter uninteresting. The element radon brings childhood memories of a giant Japanese pterodactyl monster, which is always a good thing. Learning about radioactivity is always interesting because of my childhood spent watching Japanese monster movies. I can see not only the flaws in the movie science, but also the inspiration and interpretation of science. I also like how Marie Curie's legacy continues, highlighting the mark left on the world by refugee scientists. If I had a bae, I would tell them that bubbles are not simply fun toys, but have proved exceptionally vital to modern science.