Dr. Eisenhower, Johns Hopkins University president, opens this tenth season of Johns Hopkins television. Lynn Poole discusses increasing U. S. energy needs and predicts that the world may run out of coal in 1000 years and oil in 100 years, making solar energy a critical commodity. A film clip shows the sun's surface and its energy generation is discussed. John Yellott, executive director for the Association for Applied Solar Energy, says that space heating will be the first large use of solar energy. He explains the workings of a solar-heated house with auxiliary heat pump designed by University of Minnesota architecture student Peter Lee and engineered by Bridgers and Paxton. According to Mr. Yellot, the basic instruments of solar energy are collectors, concentrators, photoelectricity, and photochemistry. He shows how solar stills can convert salt water into fresh; solar furnaces can be used for metallurgy and other research; and solar stoves can be designed for arid countries where fuel is scarce. Mr. Poole uses a photo flood light to light a cigarette and shows how selenium cells operate a photoelectric exposure meter and 8mm movie camera. Mr. Yellott demonstrates a radio/phonograph developed by Admiral Corp. to run on solar cells with backup storage batteries. Mr. Yellot concludes that at this time large scale uses of solar energy are too expensive, but solar is ideal for small amounts of energy in isolated places. More research is needed in harnessing this inexhaustible source of power.

This program commemorates the fourteenth anniversary of this battle in the Philippines written about by Dr. C. Vann Woodward, history professor at Johns Hopkins University, in "The Battle for Leyte Gulf." Using maps and U.S. Navy film clips, he describes in detail the strategies and battles of this decisive naval campaign. The U. S. fleets were led by Admiral William F. Halsey and Vice Admiral Thomas C. Kincaid. Key Japanese commanders were Toyoda, Ozawa, and Kurita. Dr. Woodward concludes that Leyte was the last and most decisive battle fought between surface forces. The victory was nearly a disaster for the U.S., and the defeat was nearly a triumph for Japan since sheer chance and human frailty were critical to the outcome.

Lynn Poole and Malcolm Davies, a teacher at Baltimore Junior College, show two children, Marsha Southwick and Richard Tillman, how toys demonstrate basic science principles. For example, key wound spring toys with gears store potential energy. An animated cartoon shows the story of Luigi Galvani, who experimented with the "animal electricity" of severed frogs' legs, and Alessandro Volta, who realized animal tissue was unnecessary for conduction of electricity and built the first battery. The children compare draw, swing, arch, and cantilever bridge designs. They also consider the fulcrum/lever principle of the seesaw and an animation of the operation of a windlass. All of the scientific principles are demonstrated by a battery operated toy crane. Mr. Davies demonstrates how "Robert Robot" works using a Bendix cable and how other toys operate with little motors originally built as tiny fans for radios but made obsolete with the invention of transistors.

Dr. George Carter, a human geographer at Johns Hopkins University, studies man's relationship with the physical world and how civilizations developed. He explains the differences between independent inventionists, researchers who believe in indigenous cultures that developed independently, and diffusionists, scholars who maintain that there was early contact between civilizations. Pre-1492 contacts between the old world and the new appear impossible, but evidence shows similarities in games, instruments, tools, math, religion, etc. in both Asia and the Americas. The existence of domestic plants, such as the sweet potato, in both places and with the same name, seems proof that man crossed the oceans during pre-Columbian times. Evidence in art may support the diffusionists too, according to Dr. Gordon Ekholm, curator of archaeology at the American Museum of Natural History. He points to similar Mayan and Cambodian temples and parallel sculptural details such as trefoil arches in Mexico and in Asia.

Lynn Poole discusses x-rays for treatment and diagnosis of disease and displays a recent report from the National Academy or Sciences and National Research Council on the biological effects of radiation. Dr. Russell Morgan, Director of Radiology Dept. at Johns Hopkins University, fields questions from members of the press: Nate Hazeltine, a "Washington Post" science writer; Pare Lorentz, a film producer; and Earl Ubell, a reporter and science editor with the "New York Herald Tribune". Dr. Morgan explains that x-rays affect both individual cells and the whole body, making them more susceptible to premature aging. He discusses the research by John Lawrence on the effects of radiation on mice and their extrapolation to man. He also notes a study on radiation vs. non-radiation workers that showed no difference in life spans of the two groups. It is the amount of radiation exposure that determines the effects of the damage. For example, a chest x-ray only delivers about 1/20th roentgen, a unit of radiation. However, Dr. Morgan discusses the feasibility of a reporting system for patients' total x-ray exposure and the need for a set of standards. And he does admit that the complexity and amount of radiation exposure is increasing in diagnostic studies and could double by 1960-65. A film clip demonstrates that this radiation exposure can be reduced by filtration, distance from the x-ray machine, length of time of exposure, and protection of areas not being radiated. Mr. Poole points out that Dr. Morgan has developed a fluoroscopy machine reducing by up to ten times the radiation time. In conclusion, Dr. Morgan discusses whether the Atomic Energy Commission or the U. S. Public Health Services should be responsible for the public's radiation health problems.