00:00:00 Information about the beneficial uses of atomic energy knows no national boundaries.

00:00:25 The facts are available today, for nuclear energy isn't waiting to help people everywhere in some brave new world of the future.

00:00:32 The peaceful atom is here now to serve what President Eisenhower has termed the needs rather than the fears of mankind.

00:00:40 Nuclear reactors or atomic furnaces like this one provide the product that makes possible practical applications of nuclear energy.

00:00:49 That product is the radioisotope, the atomic tracer, a common element tagged with radiation like a sheep with a bell.

00:00:57 And because they are tagged, they can be traced, thus giving scientists, engineers, and doctors worldwide an invaluable tool for research and money-saving applications into biology, medicine, health, agriculture, and industry.

00:01:12 In the past eight years, the United States has made more than 47,500 shipments of radioisotopes to more than 2,000 users in this country,

00:01:22 and almost 3,000 shipments to 53 countries all over the globe at or below cost.

00:01:33 Today, atomic radiation controls quality of industrial production, reduces industrial costs, achieves results hitherto impossible.

00:01:43 Radioisotopes are at work today in the oil industry. Oil producers have the difficult problem of identifying each different batch of crude oil pumped from an oil field.

00:01:53 Therefore, a small amount of an atomic tracer is added to the head of each new batch of crude oil at the field.

00:02:01 Pumps force the radioactively tagged oil through pipes to the refinery.

00:02:05 A radiation counter detects the radioisotope when it arrives at the head of each new batch of oil and automatically signals refinery headquarters.

00:02:14 Savings? A half million dollars a year.

00:02:23 And the savings increase as the radioisotope is applied to oil prospecting, leak detection, and acidizing of oil wells.

00:02:32 But petroleum is only one industry. Let's turn to motors and see how the tagged atom works there.

00:02:40 Piston rings, previously made radioactive in a reactor, arrive at an engineering laboratory.

00:02:46 The lead container stops dangerous radiations. One of the rings is then attached to the piston of an automobile engine.

00:02:59 The problem is to measure how the piston ring wears in a test engine.

00:03:04 When the engine is running, the piston ring rubs against other metal, causing tiny particles of the ring to wear away due to friction.

00:03:12 These radioactive particles gradually accumulate in the engine oil.

00:03:17 By measuring the radioactivity in the oil, engineers can tell how well the piston ring resists wear.

00:03:24 Practical applications like these are already saving more than 100 million dollars a year in American industry alone.

00:03:37 Back in the engineering laboratory, instruments detect and measure the radioactivity in the oil.

00:03:43 Before radioisotopes were known, tests for wear on moving parts had to be made by slow, inaccurate methods.

00:03:51 Atoms from the radioactive iron are disintegrating and giving off bursts of energy.

00:03:57 A radiation counter picks up these bursts of energy and a scalar counts them.

00:04:02 Other radiation measuring instruments work automatically.

00:04:06 Each part of the machine records radiation counts on a tape.

00:04:10 Several dozen oil samples can be tested for radioactivity in quick succession.

00:04:15 Automatically, each oil sample is positioned and its radioactivity is counted.

00:04:28 Factories now have an invaluable aid in radioactivity.

00:04:33 In a process involving sheet material, paper or metal for instance,

00:04:37 the thickness of the product must be measured and controlled with extreme accuracy.

00:04:42 Using radioactivity, all this can be done without stopping actual production.

00:04:48 In the base of the thickness gauging machine is some radioactive material.

00:04:53 The sheet product blocks some of the radiation.

00:04:56 The thicker the material, the more particles blocked.

00:05:04 A radiation detector counts the radioactive particles passing through the sheet material.

00:05:10 The thickness gauge employing radioactivity thus instantly measures any variation in thickness

00:05:16 without costly interruptions to production.

00:05:19 The industry saves millions of dollars yearly.

00:05:28 To find dangerous flaws in metals or to test weldings,

00:05:32 an x-ray film is attached to the metal.

00:05:36 Radioactive material is taken from a lead storage safe

00:05:39 and set in place to take a picture by exposing the x-ray film.

00:05:43 Invisible rays penetrate metal.

00:05:46 Literally see into its heart, exposing the film.

00:05:50 Since rays pass through flaws more easily than through perfect areas,

00:05:54 the hidden flaws or faulty weldings are pinpointed accurately

00:05:58 when the x-ray film is developed and a picture made.

00:06:02 The tiny radioactive source can be spotted in tight or dangerous places

00:06:06 where bulky x-ray equipment could not be fitted.

00:06:09 Metallurgists, engineers and construction workers have a new partner,

00:06:13 an inexpensive partner, in the atom.

00:06:21 But the atom is more than a symbol.

00:06:24 Locked in its tiny nucleus is tremendous energy.

00:06:27 In a piece of uranium the size of a walnut, there's as much potential energy

00:06:31 as in the amount of coal to fill a 100-car train.

00:06:35 The question is how to get this power,

00:06:37 how to put this vast energy to work in the power plants to run the turbines of tomorrow.

00:06:42 Here's one way.

00:06:48 As uranium atoms in the nuclear reactor disintegrate,

00:06:51 tremendous amounts of heat are generated.

00:06:54 When the heat is transferred to a liquid

00:06:56 and the liquid is circulated from the reactor to a boiler room,

00:07:00 it can produce steam.

00:07:02 Steam drives a generator to produce electricity.

00:07:05 And we are building such a unit today,

00:07:08 the nation's first full-scale atomic power plant,

00:07:11 to produce 60,000 kilowatts of useful electricity,

00:07:14 enough for a small city.

00:07:16 It won't produce power economically competitive with coal or oil,

00:07:20 but it is a major step in that direction, a big hope for the future.

00:07:30 The future is the child of the past.

00:07:32 And here at the experimental breeder reactor, known as the EBR,

00:07:36 way back in December 1951 on an isolated desert in Idaho,

00:07:41 was produced the first useful electrical power from the atom.

00:07:45 These very motion pictures were taken with electrical power from the EBR,

00:07:50 the first motion picture cameras ever driven by the products of nuclear energy.

00:07:59 The operator brings the reactor up to power

00:08:01 to gain the high heat to be transformed to electricity.

00:08:05 This reactor is a forerunner of the machines,

00:08:07 which one day, with the help of the International Atomic Energy Agency,

00:08:12 may provide abundant electrical energy in the power-starved areas of the world.

00:08:17 Electrical power from the atom, for many years,

00:08:20 may not be economically competitive in the United States,

00:08:23 where fuel is plentiful.

00:08:25 But with technical help from this country,

00:08:27 economically competitive power reactors probably could be built

00:08:30 in a much shorter time in high-power cost areas overseas.

00:08:35 Right now, out of these first nuclear machines,

00:08:37 we're not buying power.

00:08:39 We're buying knowledge, knowledge that we wish to share.

00:08:43 The United States will open a reactor training school

00:08:45 where scientists and engineers from abroad

00:08:48 may learn the working principles of atomic energy.

00:08:57 Now at the EBR, tremendous heat has been generated

00:09:00 as the controlled chain reaction reaches a critical point.

00:09:03 Heat is used to create steam,

00:09:06 a process monitored by a trained technician.

00:09:09 In the control room, steam pressure is watched.

00:09:12 When it is right, a technician in the turbo generator room

00:09:14 opens the throttle to let steam into the turbine.

00:09:21 The drive coupling spins.

00:09:23 Useful electricity has been generated by the atom.

00:09:30 The desert is dark as the control room operator

00:09:33 gets ready to shift from standard electrical lines

00:09:36 to electricity provided by the atomic reactor.

00:09:40 When he shuts the switch,

00:09:42 all facilities inside the building, such as the machine shop,

00:09:45 and all lights outside the building,

00:09:47 will be powered by atomic energy.

00:09:50 Today, a bold experiment.

00:09:52 In future years, a reality for homes and factories

00:09:55 and schools all over the world.

00:10:00 A beacon for the future, a symbol of hope.

00:10:07 Now to the fields and farms of the world

00:10:09 where the atom means more productive farming at lower cost,

00:10:12 more and better food for a hungry world.

00:10:15 Nuclear research is finding more effective ways

00:10:18 of using fertilizers.

00:10:20 It's producing stronger strains of disease-resistant crops.

00:10:23 It's fighting plant pests and diseases of plants and livestock.

00:10:27 It's studying the mysterious growth process

00:10:29 that makes the food we eat and the coal and oil we burn.

00:10:34 Botanists at a national laboratory

00:10:36 where crops are grown under controlled radiation conditions

00:10:39 gather valuable data on effects of radiation on plants

00:10:42 and on future generations of plants.

00:10:45 This work suggests ways of developing hardier weather

00:10:48 and disease-resistant strains of food crops.

00:10:51 Altered plants may produce altered seeds,

00:10:54 a cycle that may give new types of crops to the world.

00:11:03 Yet how nature produces the food we eat

00:11:05 is a fascinating mystery for atomic investigation.

00:11:09 Photosynthesis, it's called.

00:11:11 The process plants use in taking energy from sunlight

00:11:14 and combining it with air and soil

00:11:16 to make the complex food elements

00:11:18 without which no life would survive on this planet.

00:11:22 Investigators use atomic traces

00:11:24 to identify the complicated compounds

00:11:26 produced by natural photosynthesis.

00:11:29 Knowledge from this research

00:11:31 someday may make it possible for us to manufacture food,

00:11:34 synthetic gasoline, and coal.

00:11:41 In special water-cooled greenhouses,

00:11:44 atomic researchers grow many food and medicinal plants

00:11:47 in a radioactive atmosphere.

00:11:49 From these plants come the many compounds

00:11:52 familiar to medicine and biology.

00:11:54 The crucial difference is they are radioactive.

00:11:57 They can be traced.

00:11:59 From poppies, tobacco, and other plants

00:12:01 come radioactive drugs, carbohydrates, acids, proteins, vitamins

00:12:06 that are extremely useful today

00:12:08 to researchers in medicine, biochemistry, physiology, and agriculture.

00:12:12 So atomic farmers harvest radioactive crops

00:12:16 that go to work for the knowledge of man's living environment.

00:12:26 But the most immediate benefit of atomic research to the farmer

00:12:30 is information on the most effective use of fertilizers.

00:12:33 Botanists blend radioactive tracers with soil

00:12:37 in order to study soil and plant nutrition.

00:12:40 They have already established invaluable data

00:12:43 showing where and how fertilizers should be placed

00:12:46 for maximum uptake,

00:12:48 when the plant uses the fertilizers most efficiently,

00:12:51 what fertilizers are best for various soils,

00:12:54 and how fertilizer is absorbed from the soil.

00:12:58 This vital information is saving thousands of tons of fertilizer

00:13:02 and millions of dollars every year for the farmer.

00:13:05 At the same time, research produces data

00:13:08 that may lead to better, stronger strains of plants.

00:13:12 Similar tracer research is giving valuable information on insecticides

00:13:16 and making definite headway against crop pests

00:13:19 and the diseases of fruit and shade trees.

00:13:22 Radioaction's use for food preservation and sterilization

00:13:26 also is being investigated.

00:13:34 But perhaps it's the atom's fight against suffering and disease

00:13:38 that most strongly captures our imagination.

00:13:41 Controlled radioactivity has placed us 25 years ahead

00:13:44 in the battle against pain and death.

00:13:47 Capturing the atom's probing power,

00:13:49 science has found a powerful new tool

00:13:52 to study and defeat sickness

00:13:54 and make a healthier, happier life

00:13:56 for the benefit of all mankind.

00:14:05 The versatility of the atom in medicine

00:14:07 is illustrated by the radioactive iodine atomic cocktail,

00:14:11 which not only speeds diagnosis of thyroid cancer

00:14:14 and other thyroid ailments,

00:14:16 but also is effective in treatment of some types of cancer.

00:14:19 Iodine concentrates in the thyroid,

00:14:22 and when it is tagged with radioactivity,

00:14:25 it forces the thyroid to reveal its exact condition.

00:14:29 An amazing radiation counter actually draws a picture

00:14:32 of the thyroid area to speed diagnosis for therapy.

00:14:36 Radioisotopes, the greatest research tool since the microscope.

00:14:41 Cancer research goes forward all over the world

00:14:44 with radioisotopes distributed at only 20% of cost.

00:14:48 But cancer isn't the only disease under atomic investigation.

00:14:51 Brain tumors, hyperthyroidism, leukemia, and other blood diseases,

00:14:55 hardening of the arteries, heart disease, virus infections, diabetes,

00:14:59 circulatory diseases, anemia, nervous and mental ailments,

00:15:03 all are slowly giving up some of their intimate secrets to science

00:15:07 with the aid of atomic energy.

00:15:17 We go into New York's Montefiore Hospital

00:15:19 to see a powerful aid in the fight against disease,

00:15:22 the cobalt teletherapy unit,

00:15:24 which was developed and is being improved

00:15:26 by cooperating scientists all over the world.

00:15:30 With a sharp, effective beam of atomic radiation,

00:15:33 which does not injure healthy tissue near the cancer,

00:15:36 the nuclear tool bombards deep-seated tumors

00:15:39 with a stream of invisible rays,

00:15:41 billions of particles of energy similar to X-rays,

00:15:45 but much stronger.

00:15:47 Tumors shrink, and cancer cells are destroyed

00:15:50 as this one machine gives off more radiation

00:15:53 than all the medical radium in the world.

00:15:56 No cure-all, final results will take time to evaluate,

00:15:59 but a big step forward in cancer treatment.

00:16:12 In a message to the Atoms for Peace exhibit in Rome,

00:16:15 President Eisenhower said that history will one day record

00:16:18 as the most far-reaching physical accomplishment of the century,

00:16:22 or even of 20 centuries,

00:16:24 the discoveries which in recent years

00:16:26 unlock for the use of mankind the boundless energy of the atom,

00:16:30 the versatile, peaceful atom that promotes agriculture,

00:16:33 fights disease, provides valuable radioactive traces

00:16:36 for science and industry,

00:16:38 that is the basis for future economical power

00:16:41 for cities, homes, and factories.

00:16:43 America, as President Eisenhower pointed out to the United Nations,

00:16:46 deeply desires to join countries all over the globe

00:16:50 in adapting the atom to the arts of peace.