---
title: Improvement Era
description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930.
authors:
  - Maw, Charles E.
collections:
  - periodicals
tags:
  - magazine
  - improvement-era
periodical: Improvement Era
volume: 10
number: 3
published: 1907-01
publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations
publisher_place: Salt Lake City
language: en
type: magazine
reference: 'Maw, Charles E., "Lowest Temperature Produced," *Improvement Era* 10, no. 3 (January 1907): 215.'
source:
  url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera1003unse
  transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers.
  identifier: improvementera1003unse
start_page: 215
end_page: 215
rights:
  status: public-domain
  basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1907-01)
  source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera1003unse
  publication_year: 1907
  note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1907, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright.
---

# Lowest Temperature Produced

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ON THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE. 215
masses. We might keep always on hand a given mass and meas-
ure successively the attraction between it and unknown masses,
and thus we would be able to compare with each other the un-
known masses. If one of these unknown masses, or the mass
with which they are compared, is taken as a standard, we have a
system of mass measurement no more arbitrary than those in com-
mon use.
As a matter of fact, this is exactly what is done by everyone.
In other words, we weigh bodies. In this case the mass we have
always on hand is the earth. The unknown masses whose attrac-
tion for the earth is measured are compared with the mass of a
cubic centimeter of water, or with some other arbitrary standard,
as the pound or the ton.
But we can do more than this, since the recent researches in
physics referred to above. We can take a standard mass such as
a cubic centimeter of water, measure its attraction for the earth
in dynes, and hence can calculate the total mass of the earth. For
this last calculation it is necessary to remember (what can be
proved mathematically) that in the case of an attracting sphere
the attraction due to it is the same as if the mass of the sphere
were concentrated at its center. Considering the earth a sphere
of four thousand miles radius, we merely have to calculate the
total mass of the earth on the assumption that it is all concen-
trated at a point four thousand miles from our cubic centimeter of
water or standard gram. This calculation shows that the earth is
composed of matter which on the average is about five and a half
times as dense as water. Chester Snow, A. B.

<!-- page:215 -->

Lowest Temperature Produced.
The lowest temperature yet recorded is that reached recently
by K. Olszewski in an attempt to liquefy helium. By the aid of
solid hydrogen he cooled the gas to 259 degrees below freezing
point under 180 atmospheres of pressure. Then he suddenly re-
leased the pressure to that of the atmosphere. The expansion of
the gas absorbed heat, and cooled itself to a degree estimated to
be 271 degrees below zero. Yet the helium was not liquefied, and
there appears to be little prospect of reducing it to a liquid.
We naturally ask the question, how can such a low tempera-