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2026-10-09 Internet Archive

Searches (advancedsearch API, run in Chrome and by curl): creator:(Rutherford, Ernest) OR title:("collected papers" Rutherford); title:(radio-activity) AND creator:(rutherford); title:("succession of changes in radioactive") OR title:("cause and nature of radioactivity"); title:("newer alchemy") OR title:("natural and artificial disintegration"); American Journal of Science 1905-07 and 1906-01. Texts saved in research/pages/archive-*.txt and grepped.

Downloads (research/files/): - 1904-Rutherford-Bakerian-Lecture-Succession-of-Changes-PhilTrans204.pdf (6.7 MB) [web: https://archive.org/details/philtrans01879825] - 1919-Rutherford-Atomic-Projectiles-Science-jstor1642276.pdf (1.4 MB, JSTOR Early Journal Content, free) [web: https://archive.org/details/jstor-1642276]

  1. Bakerian Lecture 1904, Phil. Trans. A 204 (1905) 169-219 [web: philtrans01879825] - Section 21 "Effect of Temperature", pp.198-199: after Curie and Danne (C. R. 138, pp.683 and 748, 1904), "These results are of great importance, for they indicate that the rate of change of the product C is not a constant, but is affected by differences of temperature. This is the first case where temperature has been shown to exert an appreciable influence on the rate of change of any radioactive product." - p.210: "The work of Curie and Danne, however, shows that the constant X of the product radium C ... is certainly altered by temperature ... The value of X at 1100 C. is about 1.4 times the normal value ... at 1300 C it is about 1.1 times the normal." - p.210 also lists the two features that separate radioactive from chemical change: expulsion of charged particles at great velocity and "an enormous amount of energy compared with the amount of matter involved".
  2. H. L. Bronson, Amer. J. Sci. 20 (July 1905) 60-64 [web: https://archive.org/details/sim_american-journal-of-science_1905-07_20_115]: repeated Curie and Danne; "temperatures between 700 and 1100 C. have very little, if any, effect on the rate of decay of the active deposit from radium"; the earlier result is explained if radium C has the shorter period and radium B is the more volatile. Thanks Rutherford for supervision.
  3. H. A. Bumstead, Amer. J. Sci. 21 (Jan 1906) 1-24 [web: https://archive.org/details/sim_american-journal-of-science_1906-01_21_121]: opening states decay is "quite uninfluenced by any external circumstances whatever" and "beyond human control"; footnote: the Curie-Danne temperature effect "has been shown to be due to the fact that the successive products of radium volatilized at different temperatures. Cf. Bronson". Test design: if X-rays explode some atoms "as dynamite is exploded by a shock, then the total energy after the absorption of the rays may be considerably greater than the energy of the rays themselves", appearing as extra heat. Compared heating of lead and zinc strips with a radiometer; lead heated much more; section 9 examines whether escaping secondary rays explain the difference. Final conclusion not extracted in this run (read pp.19-24).
  4. Radio-activity, 2nd ed., Cambridge 1905 [web: https://archive.org/details/radioactivity00ruth], sec. 270 "Possible causes of disintegration", pp.486-487: "It is conceivable, for example, that the application of some slight external force might cause instability and consequent disintegration, accompanied by the liberation of a large amount of energy, on the same principle that a detonator is necessary to start some explosives ... It has not been found possible to alter the rate of change of any product by the application of any known physical or chemical forces, unless possibly it is assumed that the force of gravitation which is not under our control may influence in some way the stability of the radio-atoms. It seems likely therefore that the cause of the disruption ... resides in the atoms themselves." Also cites Gates (Phys. Rev. 1903) on heat not destroying the activity and on quinine; Bumstead and Wheeler (1904) on emanation in air and soil.
  5. Archives des sciences physiques et naturelles (Geneva), 4e periode, t. XIX (1905) [web: https://archive.org/details/archivesdesscien419gen]: "Les problemes actuels de la radioactivite, par E. Rutherford. Memoire presente au Congres international des Arts et Sciences a Saint-Louis, septembre 1904", two parts (about pp.31-57 and pp.125-150 from the scan's running heads). p.55: "Il serait desirable de voir apparaitre maintenant une sorte de theorie chimique pour expliquer les faits et pour savoir s'il faut considerer que l'energie est empruntee a l'atome lui-meme ou a des sources exterieures." Then the argument against the external theory. p.57: the detonator passage ("de la meme maniere qu'une substance detonnante est necessaire pour produire certaines explosions. L'energie mise en liberte n'est cependant pas empruntee a la substance qui detonne mais a celle sur laquelle elle agit"). This is the text Le Bon quoted (he gives p.53).
  6. Science 50 (21 Nov 1919) 467-473, "Atomic Projectiles and their Collisions with Light Atoms" [web: jstor-1642276]: alpha-particle energy "10,000 tons of solid shot" comparison; no disintegration of helium nuclei seen; nitrogen yields long-range particles, "probably charged atoms of hydrogen or atoms of mass 2", hence "the nitrogen atom is disintegrated".
  7. The Natural and Artificial Disintegration of the Elements (Franklin Institute, Sept 1924) [web: https://archive.org/details/naturalartificia0000ruth]: helium nucleus "built up of four protons and two electrons", mass loss implies large binding energy, "four or five of the swiftest a particles would be necessary to effect its disruption"; satellite hypothesis of alpha emission with "surplus energy" given to one of several satellites.
  8. Die Radioaktivitat (Berlin 1907) [web: https://archive.org/details/dieradioaktivitt00ruth]: free; cites Bumstead and Wheeler; not searched further.
  9. Lending-only (not readable without borrowing): Collected Papers of Lord Rutherford of Nelson, vols 1-3 (1962-65): collectedpaperso0001jcha, collectedpaperso0001ruth, collectedpaperso0003ruth, collectedpaperso0002sirj_i0k2, collectedpaperso0003sirj_d5x8; The Newer Alchemy (1937): neweralchemy0000unse. Bears on: claims 1, 2, 6, 7. Result: positive.