News Herald from Port Clinton, Ohio • 4

0 0. 00 A-4 Saturday, June 11, 1988, The News Herald, Port Clinton, Ohio COMMENT Herald 115 W. Second Port Clinton, Ohio 43452 James F. Daubel, David Barth, General Manager Thomas G. Kerr, Executive Editor Darleen Rode, Office Manager David Overmyer, Circulation Manager Editorial viewpoints published in the News Herald are determined by a board consisting of the executive editor, news editor and representatives of the news staff.

Letters of 500 words or less, on subjects of general public interest, are welcome for the Letters column. Include name, address and telephone number for verification. Names and dresses are used with letters published. Legislation helps keep island, mainland air link When you're in a unique situation, you need unique Editorial solutions to problems. Put-in-Bay Township, which includes South, Middle and North Bass islands, is Ohio's only township made up just of islands.

Folks on the islands, when they need to cross Lake Erie, can usually do it by boat. In 1 the winter, there are other means of crossing, and some do trust the ice to carry their mode of transportation. But sometimes, airplane is the best way of traveling, any time of year. Island Airlines, flying out of Port Clinton, operates the islands' airfields. People have enjoyed this reliable mode of transportation, and wouldn't want it to end.

But late last year, there was talk the airfields would be gone, replaced by some other type of business or homes. A real estate agent for the airline said recently there are no plans to sell, unless "the price is right." But now the township has been given a unique authority by the Ohio Legislature, in a bill awaiting the signature of Gov. Richard Celeste. The bill glided through the House and Senate without a dissenting vote. Rep.

Fred H. Deering, D-Monroeville, represented his island voters well in drafting the bill. Soon the township trustees can do what they must to save the airport, if it comes to that. And they can take a levy to the voters that would be in excess of the current 10-mill limit, if they must. Trustees haven't made a decision, apparently because Island Airlines hasn't.

But we're glad the state legislators gave the township what it needed. It's one less worry for the year-round residents and those whose livelihoods depend on the tourist industry. Write on Ever wanted to sound off to your elected representatives? We encourage it, and to help, here are their addresses: U.S. Senate John Glenn, Democrat, 204 Russell Senate Office Building, Washington, D.C. 20510.

Represents all of Ohio. Howard M. Metzenbaum, Democrat, 406 Russell Senate Office Building, Washington, D.C. 20510. Represents all of Ohio.

U.S. House Delbert Latta, Republican, 2309 Rayburn House Office Building, Washington, D.C. 20510. Latta's 5th District includes Sandusky, Ottawa, Seneca, Erie, Williams, Henry, Defiance, Paulding, Putnam and parts of Fulton, Huron and Wood counties. Doonesbury BY GARRY TRUDEAU J.

ONLY BEEN THAT'S NOT GONE TWO WEEKS AND I'VE J.J.'S ALREADY BROUGHT SOMEONE Trudeau 2 ARE HOME. A REAL UNBELIEVABLE! PIECE OF YOU WORK, SYNDICATE PRESS UNIVERSAL 6-11 YOU ARE SCUM! HEY, MIKE. OH, THANK MIKE, WE YOU ARE THE QUIT KICKING 60D! IT'S GO THROUGH LOWEST OF ME, WILLYA? ONLY YOU! THIS EVERY THE UNIVERSAL CINCAT-E OH, RATS! NORIEGA MANY Thallium comes off shelf to help science Some chemical elements, like gold and oxygen, are household names; some, like neodymium and lutetium, aren't. But every once in a while some element that only chemists have heard of suddenly makes the news. That has just happened to the chemical element thallium.

Thallium was discovered in 1861 by the British physicist William Crookes. He was studying the wavelengths of light given off by heated minerals when he found a beautiful green line at a wavelength not listed for any element that was then known. He tracked it down and isolated a hitherto unknown element that he named "thallium" from the Greek word "thallos," meaning "green twig" in memory of the green line that had set him on the track. However, there didn't seem much one could do with thallium. It rather resembles lead in its properties.

It is a bit denser than lead and it melts at a slightly lower temperature and it is poisonous. In fact, the first use found for thallium (in 1920, nearly 60 years after it had been discovered) was as a rat poison. But now there is the matter of superconductivity. Some substances lose all electrical resistance at very low temperatures, and this property can be crucially important in various branches of science and technology. Thus people speak of supercoonductivity in connection with magnetically levitated trains, more powerful atom smashers, smaller, faster computers and controlled nuclear fusion.

Until 1986, however, no substance was known that was superconductive at temperatures higher than 2 23 degrees above absolute zero. This is very cold indeed, considering that ordinary room temperature is about 300 degrees above absolute zero and the coldest Antarctica weather is 200 degrees above absolute zero. But people had been testing only metals for the purpose. In 1986, it occured to two Swiss scientists, K.A. Mueller and J.G.

Bednorz, to try certain ceramic substances and, behold, they found superconductivity at temperatures of 36 degrees above absolute zero and promptly won Nobel prizes in 1987. A sucker, perhaps, Enough of all this depressing news. Political skulduggery, greed, famine, shootings, bombings, and nations and individuals at each other's throats. What we need is an inspirational story, an uplifting tale of goodness and compassion for one's fellow man. And today that's what I bring to raise your sagging spirits.

It was.9 p.m. on LaSalle Street in Chicago, the heart of high finance in the Midwest. The big bankers, brokers and traders had gone home. Or to bars, restaurants and clubs to spend some of their loot. But Bria Conradus was standing on aching feet outside a restaurant.

She'd worked all day as a waitress, fetching food and drink for the big-money boys. Now she was waiting for another waitress, a friend, to finish her shift. While she waited, Bria, 26, noticed a man in a wheelchair crossing the street. He was unshaven and wearing shabby clothes obviously not one of the big-money guys. When he got to the curb, he tried to push the wheels up but he couldn't.

"Can you help me?" he asked Bria. "Of course," she said, giving the chair a tug onto the sidewalk. The man sighed. "Thanks." "You're welcome." "Sometimes things get tough." "Yes, I know." "Lady, I don't even have a place to stay the night, you know that? I'm gonna have to find me an alley or someplace to park and sleep." "That's terrible." "If I had $18 I hate to ask I could get a place for the night and I'm hungry Bria's heart was touched. "Wait," she said, and went back in the restaurant to find her purse.

But when she went in, the manager glared at her. He had been looking out the window and had seen her and the man in the wheelchair. "Don't give him any money, you Science Isaac Asimov The ceramics Mueller and Bednorz studied were based on copper oxide. It seems that superconductivity depends on electrons making their way along connected sheets of copper and oxygen atoms. However, in order to get high-temperature readings, other types of atoms have to be present also.

The other atoms have to be of such elements as barium, yttrium, lanthanum and so on. In particular, it seemed that atoms have to be present also. There was no way of being sure how any of these ceramic mixtures would work. Chemists mixed different oxides (including the crucial copper oxides) in different proportions and baked them at temperatures for different times to see what would happen. It was "cookbook" chemistry and the mixtures weren't reliable.

A particular mixture might be superconductive at pretty high temperatures one time and flop miserably when the next batch was made. It all depended on how the particles of ceramic melted together under heat. The highest temperatures that superconductivity could be achieved remained less than 100 degrees above absolute zero. (There were occasional reports of higher temperatures, but these were apparently mistaken.) To be sure, even a temperature near 100 degrees above absolute zero is marvelously high compared to what existed only a few years ago, but it is still sub-Antarctic. Scientists want superconductivity at higher temperatures still.

It occurred to an American chemist, Alan but one with Comment Mike Royko understand?" the manager said. "He's a bum. I don't want you giving him money." Bria nodded. She needed the job. She's an aspiring actress, a recent graduate of the Goodman School of Drama.

But until her career gets going, waiting on tables keeps a roof over her head. But through the window, she could see the man in the wheelchair, hungry and homeless. So she made a decision. "It was a stupid thing to do, but I did it anyway," she said. She went into the kitchen and picked up a melon and a loaf of bread.

Then, hoping the manager wouldn't notice, she went back outside and held out the melon and the loaf of bread to the man in the wheelchair. He looked at the melon and the bread. Then he looked at her and said: "I don't want your -ing food!" Then the manager came through the Herman, to try thallium atoms in place of the rare earth elements. Thallium atoms are about the same size as the rare earths and would slip into the same places in the molecular structure. In May, 1987, for the first time, a ceramic without rare earth elements was found to be superconductive, and at a temperature of 80 degrees above absolute zero.

The original recipe called for oxides of copper, barium and thallium, but in early 1988, Herman added a bit of calcium to the mixture and obtained a superconductive temperature of 105 degrees above absolute zero. The mixture containing thallium was the first one to penetrate the 100-degree mark; nothing without thallium had done as well. It seemed that a great deal depended on how many layers of copper-oxygen atoms there were between the thallim layers on the boundary. The first thallium ceramic had had a single layer of copper-oxygen atoms between the thallium layers while the later one with the higher superconductive temperature had had two. Obviously, it was important to try a ceramic with three copper-oxygen layers between the thallium boundaries, and when this was done a superconductive temperature as high as 125 degrees was obtained.

It is uncertain how many more layers can be piled on, and there are theoretical reasons for supposing the temperature may not go up indefinitely. Still, if as many as 10 layers of copperoxygen can be sandwiched in along with the thallium and other elements, superconductive temperatures as high as 200 degrees above absolute zero may be obtained. The Antarctic-temperature barrier will have been broken. Just the same, thallium remains very poisonous and may be too dangerous for industrial use. So scientists may have to search for another substance that will serve the same purpose, but thallium will have played its role in advancing our technological ability.

Isaac Asimov's column appears on Saturdays and is distributed by the Los Angeles Times Syndicate. a big heart doorway, grabbed the melon and bread, and said: "I warned you. I don't want to see you again. You're through." Bria followed him back inside, apologizing and pleading for another chance. "He told me he'd think about it, that I should talk to him in a day or so.

"So I came back and talked to him. But he told me that he couldn't take me back because all the other employees knew he had fired me, and if he backed down they wouldn't respect him for not sticking to a decision. Feeling low, Bria went next door to another restaurant where she knows some of the employees. She had a cup of coffee and told them about being fired for trying to help a man in a wheelchair. "Well, he seems to be in bad shape," Bria said, "even if he didn't want the bread and melon." "Actually," one of them said, "he's not as bad off as he looks.

If you wait long enough, you'll see him wheel himself over to his car, get out of his wheelchair, fold it up, put it in the trunk, then get in and drive away." "I guess I'm a sucker," Bria says. Maybe, but at least you have a heart as big as well, as big as a melon. Mike Royko's column appears regularly and is distributed by Tribune Media Services. SHORT RIBS tm by Dick Wright 01998 PWI've Been asked HOW TO SaY a Few ABOUT WOrDS aBOUT 'SPOILeD" George and "Preppy".