The room in the laboratory is very different from the architecture of this era, and there are no pillars in the middle of the room, and the room feels unusually empty at first glance. The brick and concrete bungalows, which are about 10 meters long, are divided into three sections, each of which is about 9 x 6 meters.

The floor is made of concrete, the roof above is made of suspended ceilings, and bright glass windows are set on the east and west walls. The walls and ceilings of the room are plastered and white, like a hospital room.

In the middle of each room, there are two fixed white marble tables, which are filled with various glassware, and in the cabinets erected against the wall, there are **** labeled chemicals, or sample minerals. If it weren't for the accompanying people around him, Zhu Youzhen probably thought that he had returned to a middle school laboratory in the later life.

The laboratory that can be shown to him, the emperor, is naturally the cleanest place among the bungalows by the lake. Zhu Youzhen walked to the edge of the stone platform and asked curiously at the researcher who had stopped the operation, "What experiments are you doing?" Aren't these bone slag? ”

The researcher hurriedly pulled down his mask and replied to Chongzhen: "Back to Your Majesty, after we used alum, potassium nitrate and human urine to heat together, we extracted a substance from the urine that can be turned into phosphorus fire.

This white object can spontaneously combust at very low temperatures, but when it is isolated from the air and heated or exposed to sunlight, it will turn into a red, stable substance. We named this substance phosphorus, the former is white phosphorus, the latter is red phosphorus, and when red phosphorus is heated, it becomes white phosphorus again.

This substance, together with copper sulfate, can replace the copper inside. This phosphorus fire used to come from dry bones, so I wanted to see if I could extract phosphorus from bone meal. ”

Zhu Youzhen thought for a while and said, "It's a good idea, but you can try to stick the red phosphorus on the sandpaper, and then use sulfur to stick it to the small wooden stick, and see if you can make something that is convenient for ignition."

In addition, it is not necessary to extract phosphorus from bone meal, you try to find other minerals and use sulfuric acid as a processing method to see if you can get the same phosphorus compound as in bone meal. ”

After talking to the researcher for a few words, Zhu Youzhen turned around and asked Wang Chengen. Only then did I know that since the whaling industry has been vigorously promoted, 2,200 barrels of whale oil have been shipped back from overseas this year, each barrel of whale oil is about 159 liters. More than 150 tonnes of whale bones and bone meal were brought back, and most of the bone meal was used as fertilizer or feed. The bones are used to make bone glue and are used by the Chemistry Branch for research.

2,200 barrels of whale oil are worth more than 157,000 yuan, and whether they are used to make soap or candles, they are excellent and high-quality products. Of course, there are some better quality whale oil sold directly as edible oil, although this oil has a slight fish smell, but for the military and civilians of Dongjiang Town, who have no oil and water all year round, it is impossible to be too picky.

Combined with the value of whale skin and whale meat, the whaling company under the name of the government has earned about 250,000 yuan this year, absorbing more than 1,100 fishermen. After deducting 50,000 yuan of labor wages and 30,000 yuan of various costs, the whaling company made a net profit of 170,000 yuan. After leaving a profit of 20,000 yuan, another 150,000 yuan was allocated to the name of the Royal Academy of Sciences.

Listening to Wang Chengen's distressed complaint, Zhu Youzhen could only smile and didn't say anything. The Chemistry Branch will spend more than 3 million yuan this year, while the entire Royal Academy of Sciences will spend close to 4 million yuan, and the palace will only spend about 3.2 million yuan this year.

If calculated according to previous years, the annual expenditure of the palace is about 8 million yuan. In other words, the cost saved by the large reduction of manpower in the palace was finally filled by the Royal Academy of Sciences, which is no wonder that Wang Chengen and these chamberlains are a little unwilling.

The most important thing is that although the Royal Academy of Sciences has some effect on the whole, the waste of the Chemistry Branch is too staggering. Just to make a high-magnification microscope, the number of optical mirror embryos worth 2 or 30 yuan is not calculated by one or hundred, but by thousands.

Although the completion of the first high-magnification microscope is the manufacture of the second and third high-magnification microscopes, which greatly reduces the difficulty and cost, the cost of up to 60,000 yuan is too terrifying. A courtyard house of four or five acres in the capital is only priced at 2,500 yuan.

What made Wang Chengen feel the most indignant was that such a valuable treasure was not stored in the palace, but in the chemical branch, and almost everyone could use it.

Wang Chengen once euphemistically told Chongzhen that even if it is placed in the chemical branch, the palace should send personnel to take care of this microscope to prevent someone from accidentally damaging this instrument. Chongzhen naturally would not agree to this request, but since this microscope was too expensive, he was also a little worried, so he specially summoned Xu Guangqi for this purpose and asked him to take good care of this microscope.

Although he did not have the emperor's consent, Wang Chengen had already regarded the Royal Academy of Sciences as the greatest enemy of the inner court, an enemy who stole the wealth of the inner court. From time to time, he had to say a few words in front of Chongzhen, hoping that the emperor would wake up and stop being deceived by these Western monks and alchemists.

After Zhu Youzhen turned around, he was about to go to the laboratory next door to have a look, and before he walked together, he stopped Li Ciyu.

Li Ciyu sweated on his forehead, opened his hands to stop him and said, "Your Majesty, there is a little problem over there, and we can't go in for the time being, let's go out and talk." ”

Zhu Youzhen stopped, looked at him with some curiosity and asked, "What's wrong?" ”

Li Ciyu replied in a low voice: "Tangshan Qianxi has sent a few pieces of softer metal minerals, and I want us to analyze the composition inside."

A few days ago, when a researcher mixed and heated the same mineral with concentrated hydrochloric acid, a yellowish-green gas was produced, which had a strong pungent odor, and he had to stop the experiment at that time.

Today he wanted to repeat the test, but he accidentally broke the glass ** containing gas, and now the air is changing inside..."

"The yellow-green gas, heavier than air, has a pungent smell, and it sounds a lot like *." It can react with concentrated hydrochloric acid to form *, which should be manganese dioxide. Zhu Youzhen lowered his head and thought in his heart for a long time, and finally remembered something.

*But it is a good thing, it forms hypochlorous acid when exposed to water, which has a purifying (bleaching) effect. It can also be made into disinfectant powder from lime milk or quicklime. If it reacts with phosphorus, which has just been discovered, it can also be used to make insecticides.

Moreover, it can also bleach paper and cotton cloth, and the effect is much more stable than sulfur dioxide.

Zhu Youzhen immediately looked up at Li Ciyu and said, "What about the researcher?" I want to talk to him..."

After Zhu Youzhen asked the researcher about the steps of the experiment, he decided on the name of the gas and the name of the mineral, and suggested a complete test procedure.

As a heavier-than-air gas, * can be collected by the downward air exhaust method, while excess gases can also be absorbed by a caustic soda solution.

In view of the difficulty of producing concentrated hydrochloric acid, he also suggested that a mixture of sodium chloride, pyrolite, and concentrated sulphuric acid be heated in a lead still or clay pot to see if the same gas could be obtained.

When Zhu Youzhen said that when he was elated, he had the posture of personally going into battle to do this chemical experiment.

However, as soon as his idea came out, he was stopped by everyone, and Xu Guangqi felt that he had spent enough time in the Chemistry Branch today, and he persuaded the enthusiastic Zhu Youzhen to leave this place half-forced, half-persuasive.

Although there was still an itch in his heart, under the persuasion of everyone, Zhu Youzhen finally gave in and left.

From the branch of chemistry to the headquarters of the Royal Academy of Sciences opposite Guozijian, there are about 10 miles, although the weather is cold after winter, but as the New Year approaches, the pedestrians, cars and horses on the streets have increased instead of decreasing.

Since Zhu Youzhen did not use the emperor's car to travel, the pedestrians, cars and horses on the road did not pull over to avoid it, and only regarded their convoy as a certain noble's usual travel.

For Zhu Youzhen, sitting in the carriage and watching the daily life of the civilians in the capital is also a rare fun.

Although in the middle of the year, the city hall of the capital has announced that vehicles and pedestrians must drive on the right, and no one except the emperor's car is allowed to drive in the middle.

However, it is obvious that the people of the capital are not used to it, and they have to follow the rules of the roadside instead of taking the avenue. These cars, horses and pedestrians rushed into the middle of the road at the first opportunity, and they had to be scolded by the patrol police who opened the way for Chongzhen, so they got out of the way.

Seeing that from time to time someone outside the car was blocked from the road, poking their heads out of the car window and scolding in a hurry, Zhu Youzhen found it interesting. Although there is a difference of several hundred years, the character of this Chinese does not seem to have changed much.

Between stops and turns, the group finally turned into Chengxian Street. Different from the busy street in front of the Bell and Drum Tower, entering the stele workshop on Chengxian Street, Zhu Youzhen felt like he had entered someone's garden from the downtown area.

The shouting on both sides of the street suddenly disappeared, although there were many pedestrians on the road, but they walked much more leisurely, and the carriages on the road were also very well-behaved, and even the horses pulling the carts were much more elegant.

It seems that the place covered by this Wenqu star is extraordinary, Zhu Youzhen couldn't help but complain secretly in his heart.

After entering the Royal Academy of Sciences, Zhu Youzhen first met with the researchers of the two branches of physics and mathematics, and after a routine condolence.

He asked the academicians in front of him with some curiosity: "Two days ago, I asked you to make an assessment of the number of Daming banknotes, do you have a conclusion today?" ”