Abstract
DR. BRUCE BILLINGS, of the Polaroid Research Laboratory (Polaroid Corporation, Cambridge 39, Mass.), has recently given to the American Astronomical Society and the American Association for the Advancement of Science an account of a new type of light filter, making use of the familiar process of building up a filter by the use of crystal plates. Dr. Billings has varied the method by using plates the optical characteristics of which change under the influence of an electric field. This admits of much more rapid and easily controlled changes in the wave-lengths transmitted through the filter than was possible with earlier types. No details are given in the account available as to the narrowness of the band of transmitted light ; but it is claimed that it allows for changes in the velocity in the line of sight in prominence streamers so as to give a complete record of the motions of parts of a prominence from a series of pictures taken at different wave-lengths in rapid succession. This promises a marked advance in our knowledge of the three-dimensional structure and whirling motions in prominences, just when they are becoming of increased interest to the student of solar and terrestrial phenomena. Further details will be awaited with interest.
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A New Polarizing Light-Filter. Nature 159, 192 (1947). https://doi.org/10.1038/159192c0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/159192c0