but it is cased externally with wood, which serves as the insulating material. Against the inner metal wall of the incubator, and upon its internal surface, there are disposed a number of vertical tubes, which open through the roof above into a common discharging funnel. Below, at the bottom of the incubator they receive the heated gases of several burners, which as they pass through them radiate their heat evenly throughout the incubation chamber. In each side wall, at the bottom of the chamber, is an adjustable ventilating valve.
Inside the incubation chamber, and situated against its left-hand wall, is a U-shaped bimetallic thermostat of the Roux design, described below. This very accurately controls the temperature of the incubator.
(c) Cool Incubators.—In bacteriological laboratories there are two standards of temperature, one chiefly for the culture of non-pathogenic organisms and the other for the pathogenic forms. The first standard of temperature lies between 18° and 20° C., and the second between 35° and 38° C. But in hot countries, and even in temperate regions during the summer, the external temperature is much higher than the former of these two standards, with the result that many cultures, especially the gelatine ones, are spoiled. The difficulty is often partially overcome by running cold water through the incubator.
Hearson, however, has constructed a “cool biological incubator,” in which by an ingenious device the expansion or contraction of the thermostatic capsule deflects a horizontal pipe (C) (fig. 12), through which cold water from an ordinary tap is kept running, in one of two directions. If it is deflected so as to open into the tube (D), the cold water passes into the tank (F), where it is warmed by a gas flame, and thence it passes into the water-jacket of the incubator. If it is deflected so as to open into the pipe (E), it then runs through the ice tank (B), containing broken ice, before passing through the water-jacket of the incubator. If it poured into neither of these pipes it then simply passes out through the pipe (H) to the waste pipe (N). By this device the temperature of the incubator can be kept constant at any desired point, even though it may be some 30° to 40° C. below that of the external air.
Dr Roux has also designed an incubator which can be maintained at a constant temperature below that of the surrounding air. This also depends upon the principle of carrying water through an ice-safe, which then traverses a pipe within the incubator chamber before passing into the water-jacket of the machine. The heat-regulating apparatus is a bimetallic thermostat. The incubator is made by Lequeux of Paris.
The most recent forms of all kinds of incubators, made by Hearson of London, Lequeux of Paris and Lautenschläger of Berlin are both heated and regulated by electricity. The heating is accomplished by electric radiators.
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| Fig. 12.—Hearson’s Cool Biological Incubator. |
In Hearson’s machines the regulation of the temperature is brought about by the breaking or making of the electric current, through the lifting or depression of a platinum contact, actuated by the expansion or contraction of the thermostatic capsule.
In Roux’s apparatus, made by Lequeux, the make and break is attained by the movement of one limb of a bimetallic thermostat, and in some forms a resistance coil and rheostat are placed in the circuit.
At the Pasteur Institute in Paris, and at other large laboratories in France, the bacteriological incubator is raised to the dimensions of a room. In the centre of this room is a large boiler heated by gas-burners, the fumes from which pass through a large flue to the outside. The flame of the burners is regulated by a bimetallic thermostat. The gas by-pass can be regulated by an attendant. The cultures are contained in vessels placed on shelves, which are ranged round the side of the room.
Human Incubators.
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| Fig. 13.—Tarnier’s Incubator. |
The first incubator designed for rearing children who are too weak to survive under normal conditions, or who are prematurely born, is that of Dr Tarnier. It was constructed in 1880 and was first used at the Paris Maternity Hospital. Its form is that of a rectangular box measuring 65 × 30 × 50 centimetres (fig. 13). It is divided into an upper and lower chamber; the former contains the infant, while the latter serves as a heating chamber, and in reality is simply a modified water-tank. The partition (P) which divides the incubator into two chambers does not extend the whole length of it, so that the upper and lower chambers are at one end of the apparatus in communication with each other. It is through this passage that the heated air from the lower chamber passes into the upper one containing the infant. The narrow bottom chamber C serves to prevent loss of heat from the base of the water-bottles. The
