the years its coverage was widened by the inclusion of papers in the fields 

 of stream surveys, chemistry, analytical methods, etc. A new section on 

 the biology of water supply and water pollution was included in the review 

 of the literature of 1953. A larger section was submitted for inclusion in 

 the 1954 review. This dealt with bioassays, studies of the toxicity of 

 chemicals and wastes to aquatic life, and biological indicators of pollu- 

 tion. The coverage was greatly expanded in the following years, and every 

 effort was made to supply summaries of papers dealing with environmental 

 requirements, the toxicity of wastes and other materials to aquatic life, 

 and water quality criteria and standards. 



To promote further the objectives of the meeting held in Washington, 

 D.C., in the fall of 1950, the First Seminar on Biological Problems in 

 Water Pollution was held in Cincinnati in April 1956. This meeting was 

 attended by representatives from industrial concerns, academic institu- 

 tions, state conservation and health departments, and federal agencies. 

 Twenty-eight states and four provinces of Canada were represented. Biolog- 

 ical indicators of pollution, water quality criteria, and the use and value 

 of bioassays were discussed. 



Because courts in some states were reluctant to accept as evidence the 

 results of bioassay tests in pollution cases, it was deemed advisable to 

 include a description of proposed bioassay methods in "Standard Methods for 

 the Examination of Water and Wastewater" by the American Public Health 

 Association et aj_. Proposed standard bioassay methods, prepared by a 

 committee under my chairmanship and based largely on the 1951 report of the 

 Doudoroff committee, were included in the 11th edition of this work which 

 was published in 1960. Their inclusion was instrumental in promoting more 

 uniform procedures, better and more comparable data, and greater use of 

 bioassays as a research and monitoring tool for the abatement of pollution. 



From 1955 through 1966 research for the determination of water quality 

 requirements for aquatic life, the improvement of bioassay methods, and the 

 determination of the toxicity of pesticides was promoted to the fullest 

 extent possible by the Biology Section of the Cincinnati laboratory. The 

 research findings of the section during this period were described in 102 

 publications. 



The Second Seminar on Biological Problems in Water Pollution was held 

 at Cincinnati in 1959. Attendance was much larger at this meeting than at 

 the first seminar. The seminar theme was the effects of pesticides on 

 aquatic life and allowable concentrations of various pesticides in the 

 aquatic environment. Other subjects discussed were the effects of the dis- 

 charge of radioactive materials, environmental requirements of aquatic 

 life, marine and estuarine problems, and the practical application of 

 biological findings in pollution abatement. 



Contact was maintained with the private national conservation agencies, 

 and the leaders or staff members of a number of them attended the second 

 seminar. An advisory committee on water quality standards for aquatic life 

 made up of the leaders of these groups was established in 1960. Members of 

 this committee were Ira Gabrielson, director of the Wildlife Foundation 



26 



