[Footnote 1: Paper read in Section C, Domestic Health, at the
Hastings Health Congress, on Friday, May 3, 1889.]
By Dr. B. W. RICHARDSON.
During the time when I was engaged in my preliminary medical
studies--for I never admit to this day of being anything less than a
medical student--the substance called ozone became the topic of much
conversation and speculation. I cannot say that ozone was a discovery
of that date, for in the early part of the century Von Marum had
observed that when electrical discharges were made through oxygen in a
glass cylinder inverted over water, the water rose in the cylinder as
if something had either been taken away from the gas, or as if the gas
itself had been condensed, and was therefore occupying a smaller
space. It had also been observed by many electricians that during a
passage of the electric spark through air or oxygen, there was a
peculiar emanation or odor which some compared to fresh sea air,
others to the air after a thunderstorm, when the sky has become very
clear, the firmament blue, and the stars, if visible, extremely
bright.
But it was not until the time, or about the time, of which I have
spoken, 1846-49, that these discovered but unexplained phenomena
received proper recognition. The distinguished physicist Schonbein
first, if I may so say, isolated the substance which yielded the
phenomena, and gave to it the name, by which it has since generally
been known, of _ozone_, which means, to emit an odor; a name, I have
always thought, not particularly happy, but which has become,
practically, so fully recognized and understood, that it would be
wrong now to disturb it.
Schonbein made ozone by the action of the electric spark on oxygen. He
collected it, he tested its chemical properties, he announced it to be
oxygen in a modified form, and he traced its action as an active
oxidizer of various substances, and especially of organic substances,
even when they were in a state of decomposition.
But Schonbein went further than this. He argued that ozone was a
natural part of the atmosphere, and that in places where there was no
decomposition, that is to say, in places away from great towns, ozone
was present. On the high tower of a cathedral in a big city he
discovered ozone; in the city, at the foot of the tower, he found no
ozone at the same time. He argued, therefore, that the ozone above was
used up in purifying the town below, and so suggested quite a new
explanation of the purification of air.
The subject was very soon taken up by English observers, and I
remember well a lecture upon it by Michael Faraday, in which that
illustrious philosopher, confirming Schonbein, stated that he had
discovered ozone freely on the Brighton Downs, and had found the
evidence of it diminishing as he approached Brighton, until it was
lost altogether in the town itself.
Such was the beginning of our knowledge of ozone, the precise nature
of which has not yet been completely made out. At the present time it
is held to be oxygen condensed. To use a chemical phrase, the molecule
of oxygen, which in the ordinary state is composed of two atoms, is
condensed, in ozone, as three atoms. By the electric spark discharged
in dry oxygen as much as 15 per cent. may, under proper conditions, be
turned into ozone. Ozone has also been found to be heavier than air.
Professor Zinno says, that compared with an equal volume of air its
density is equal to 1,658, and that it is forty-eight times heavier
than hydrogen. Heat decomposes it; at the temperature of boiling water
it begins to decompose. In water it is much less soluble than oxygen,
and indeed is practically insoluble; when made to bubble through
boiling water, it ceases to be ozone. The oxidizing power of ozone is
very much greater than that of oxygen, and, according to Saret, when
ozone is decomposed, one part of it enters into combination, the other
remains simply as oxygen.
It is remarkable that some substances, like turpentine and cinnamon,
absorb ozone and combine with it, a simple fact of much greater
importance than has ever been attached to it. I found, for instance,
that cinnamon which by exposure to the air has been made odorless and,
as it is said, "spoiled," can be made to reabsorb ozone and gain a
kind of freshness. It is certain also that some substances which are
supposed to have disinfecting properties owe what virtues they possess
to the presence of ozone.
On some grand scale ozone is formed in the air, and my former friend
and colleague, the late Dr. Moffatt, of Hawarden, with whom I wrote a
paper on "Meteorology and Disease," read before the Epidemiological
Society in 1852-53, described what he designated ozone periods of the
atmosphere, connecting these with storms. When the atmospheric
pressure is decreasing, when with that there is increasing warmth and
moisture, and when south and southwesterly winds prevail, then ozone
is active; but when the atmospheric pressure is increasing, when the
air is becoming dry and cold, and north and northeasterly winds
prevail, then the presence of ozone is less active. These facts have
also been put in another way, namely, that the maximum period of ozone
occurs when there is greatest evaporation of water from the earth, and
the minimum when there is greatest condensation of water on the earth;
a theory which tallies well with the idea that ozone is most freely
present when electricity is being produced, least present when
electricity is in smallest quantity. Mr. Buchan, reporting on the
observations of the Scottish Meteorological Society, records that
ozone is most abundant from February to June, when the average amount
is 6.0; and least from July to January, when the average is 5.7; the
maximum, 6.2, being reached in May, and the minimum, 5.3, in November.
This same excellent observer states that "ozone is more abundant on
the sea coast than inland; in the west than the east of Great Britain;
in elevated than in low situations; with southwest than with northeast
winds; in the country than in towns; and on the windward than the
leeward side of towns."
Recently a very singular hypothesis has been broached in regard to the
blue color of the firmament and ozone. It has been observed that when
a tube is filled with ozone, the light transmitted through it is of a
blue color; from which fact it is assumed that the blue color of the
sky is due to the presence of this body in the higher atmospheric
strata. The hypothesis is in entire accord with the suggestion of
Professor Dove, to which Moffatt always paid the greatest respect,
viz., that the source of ozone for the whole of the planet is
equatorial, and that the point of development of ozone is where the
terrestrial atmosphere raised to its highest altitude, at the equator,
expands out north and south in opposite directions toward the two
poles, to return to the equator over the earth as the trade winds.
It is necessary for all who would understand the applications of ozone
for any purpose, whether for bleaching purposes or pure chemical
purposes, or for medical or sanitary purposes, to understand these
preliminary facts concerning it, facts which bring me to the
particular point to which I wish to refer to-day.
In my essay describing the model city, Hygeiopolis, it was suggested
that in every town there should be a building like a gas house, in
which ozone should be made and stored, and from which it should be
dispensed to every street or house at pleasure. This suggestion was
made as the final result of observations which had been going on since
I first began to work at the subject in 1852. It occurred to me from
the moment when I first made ozone by Schonbein's method, that the
value of it in a hygienic point of view was incalculable.
To my then young and enthusiastic mind it seemed that in ozone we had
a means of stopping all putrefaction, of destroying all infectious
substances, and of actually commanding and destroying the causes which
produced the great spreading diseases; and, although increase of years
and greater experience have toned down the enthusiasm, I still believe
that here one of the most useful fields for investigation remains
almost unexplored.
In my first experiments I subjected decomposing blood to ozone, and
found that the products of decomposition were instantly destroyed, and
that the fluid was rendered odorless and sweet. I discovered that the
red corpuscles of fresh blood decomposed ozone, and that coagulated
blood underwent a degree of solution through its action. I put dead
birds and pieces of animal substances that had undergone extreme
decomposition into atmospheres containing ozone, and observed the
rapidity with which the products of decomposition were neutralized and
rendered harmless. I employed ozone medicinally, by having it inhaled
by persons who were suffering from foetor of the breath, and with
remarkable success, and I began to employ it and have employed it ever
since (that is to say, for thirty-seven years), for purposes of
disinfection and deodorization, in close rooms, closets, and the like.
I should have used it much more largely but for one circumstance,
namely, the almost impracticable difficulty of making it with
sufficient ease and in sufficient quantities to meet the necessities
of sanitary practice. We are often obstructed in this way. We know of
something exceedingly useful, but we cannot utilize it. This was the
case with ozone. I hope now that difficulty is overcome. If it is, we
shall start from this day on a new era in regard to ozone as an
instrument of sanitation.
As we have seen, ozone was originally made by charging dry oxygen or
common dry air with electricity from sparks or points. Afterward
Faraday showed that it could be made by holding a warm glass rod in
vapor of ether. Again he showed that it could be made by passing air
over bright phosphorus half immersed in water. Then Siemens modified
the electric process by inventing his well known ozone tube, which
consists of a wide glass tube coated with tinfoil on its outside, and
holding within it a smaller glass tube coated with tinfoil on its
surface. When a current of dry air or oxygen was passed in current
between these two tubes, and the electric spark from a Ruhmkorf coil
was discharged by the terminal wires connected with tinfoil surfaces,
ozone was freely produced, and this was no doubt the best method, for
by means of a double-acting hand bellows currents of ozone could be
driven over very freely. One of these tubes with hand bellows
attached, which I have had in use for twenty-four years, is before the
meeting, and answers as well as ever. The practical difficulty lies in
the requirement of a battery, a large coil, and a separate bellows as
well as the tube.
My dear and most distinguished friend, the late Professor Polli, of
Milan, tried to overcome the difficulties arising from the use of the
coil by making ozone chemically, namely, by the decomposition of
permanganate of potassa with strong sulphuric acid. He placed the
permanganate in glass vessels, moistened it gradually with the acid,
and then allowed the ozone, which is formed, to diffuse into the air.
In this way he endeavored, as I had done, to purify the air of rooms,
especially those vitiated by the breaths of many people. When he
visited me, not very long before his death, he was enthusiastic as to
the success that must attend the utilization of ozone for
purification, and when I expressed a practical doubt, he rallied me by
saying I must not desert my own child. At the theater La Scala, on the
occasion of an unusually full attendance, Polli collected the
condensible part of the exhaled organic matter, by means of a large
glass bell filled with ice and placed over the circular opening in the
roof, which corresponds with the large central light. The deposit on
this bell was liquid and had a mouldy smell; was for some few days
limpid, but then became very thick and had a nauseous odor. When mixed
with a solution of one part glucose to four parts of water, and kept
at a temperature of from 20° to 24° C., this liquid underwent a slow
fermentation, with the formation, on the superficies, of green must;
during the same period of time, and placed under the same conditions,
a similar glucose solution underwent no change whatever.
By the use of his ozone bottles Polli believed that he had supplied a
means most suitable for directly destroying in the air miasmatic
principles, without otherwise interfering with the respiratory
functions. The ozonized air had neither a powerful nor an offensive
smell, and it might be easily and economically made. The smell of
ozone was scarcely perceptible, and was far less disagreeable than
chlorine, bromine, and iodine, while it was more efficacious than
either of these; if, therefore, its application as a purifier of a
vitiated air succeeded, it would probably supply all the exigences of
defective ventilation in crowded atmospheres. In confined places
vessels might be placed containing mixtures of permanganate of potassa
or soda and acid in proper quantities, and of which the duration of
the action was known; or sulphuric acid could be dropped upon the
permanganate.
This idea of applying ozone was no doubt very ingenious, and in the
bottles before us on the table, which have been prepared in Hastings
by Mr. Rossiter, we see it in operation. The disadvantages of the plan
are that manipulation with strong sulphuric acid is never an agreeable
or safe process, and that the ozone evolved cannot be on a large scale
without considerable trouble.
In 1875 Dr. Lender published a process for the production of ozone. In
this process he used equal parts of manganese, permanganate of potash,
and oxalic acid. When this mixture is placed in contact with water,
ozone is quickly generated. For a room of medium size two spoonfuls of
this powder, placed in a dish and occasionally diluted with water,
would be sufficient. As the ozone is developed, it disinfects the
surrounding air without producing cough.
Lender's process is very useful when ozone is wanted on a limited
scale. We have some of it here prepared by Mr. Rossiter, and it
answers exceedingly well; but it would be impossible to generate
sufficient ozone by this plan for the large application that would be
required should it come into general use. The process deserves to be
remembered, and the physician may find it valuable as a means by which
ozone may be medically applied, to wounds, or by inhalation when there
are foetid exhalations from the mouth or nostrils.