Air and water : their impurities and purification / by Henry Bollman Condy.

  • Condy, Henry Bollman.
Date:
1862
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Air and water : their impurities and purification / by Henry Bollman Condy. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service. The original may be consulted at London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service.

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    combinations, and thrown into a peculiar dynamic and allotropic condition of the nature of polarization, by means of those currents of electricity, which are at all times flowing silently through the air. The result of the action of 'electricity on oxygen is that a certain portion of it undergoes a process of negative polarization, while another portion is simultaneously transformed into an opposite state of polarity. That portion which is negatively polarized is distinguished by the name of ozone: to that which is positively polarized, the term antozone has been given. On coming in contact, these two bodies to a certain extent neutralize one another, and by their combination produce common or neutral oxygen. The comportment of permanganic acid, with peroxide of barium, can only be explained in this way: the superadded atoms of loosely combined oxygen in those two substances, are thrown into opposite states of polarity, and unite to form ordinary oxygen, thus:— + +-+ +- +-- + Mn20403 4- 3BaO 0= 2Mn02 + 3BaO + 0303 * permanganic binoxide of binoxide of baryta. common acid. barium. manganese. oxygen. In this tendency to union between ozone and antozone, probably lies the reason why it is found impossible to ozonise more than a limited proportion of any given volume of oxygen, however long the ozonising process may be continued. It has been estimated that the amount of ozone capable of being produced, hardly ever exceeds 13'00 by volume of the gas operated upon. Some observers have brought forward this circum- stance as one calculated to diminish our confidence in the part which ozone artificially produced, is qualified to perform as a disinfecting agent ;f but when we call to * Schonbcin lias recently intimated to Mr. Faraday that be has succeeded in obtaining free ozone mixed with common oxygen, by the addition of binoxide of barium to a solution of manganate of potash in sulphuric acid.—Chemical New8,vo\. v., p. 350. t Dr. Hornidge on Ozone; Lancet, April 6, 1861.