REPORT OF EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE Xxvii 



A full report with respect to the organization of this laboratory 

 and of the various circumstances which led up to it will be published 

 in a monograph soon to be printed among the publications of the 

 Carnegie Institution. 



Abstract of Report. — Messrs. Coville and MacDougal were ap- 

 pointed a committee on the subject of a Desert Botanical Laboratory. 



After their visit to the principal points in the southwestern desert 

 region, a laboratory location was selected near Tucson, Arizona. 



The building site, water supply, road, and electrical connection 

 were presented by the Chamber of Commerce of Tucson, the cash 

 value of these concessions amounting to about $1,400, and the dis- 

 cussions that took place initiating what is still more valuable — the 

 hearty interest and cooperation of the citizens in the purposes of the 

 laboratory. 



A laboratory building has been planned, contracted for, and com- 

 pleted, the contract price being $3,843. The laboratory has been 

 equipped with books, apparatus, furniture, and supplies, at a cost 

 of $1,813.50. 



Dr. W. A. Cannon, recently connected with the New York Botan- 

 ical Garden (Bronx park), New York, was appointed resident inves- 

 tigator, and took charge of the laboratory September i . He is now 

 engaged in investigating the root systems of desert plants with 

 reference to their special devices for the absorption and storage of 

 water. 



The privileges of the laboratory have been granted to Professor 

 Charles B. Davenport, University of Chicago, for an inquiry into 

 the morphological and physiological adjustments of desert animals 

 to their habitat. Other applications are pending. 



The committee has presented an illustrated report on the labora- 

 tory location, which is now in press as a publication of the Institution. 



E. W. Olive, Crawfordsville, Ind. Grant No. 32. Researches on the 

 cytological relations of the Amceba, Acrasics^ and Myxoniycetes. 



$1,000. 



Abstract of Report. — Mr. Olive's work has been carried on in Pro- 

 fessor Strasburger's laboratory in the Botanical Institute at Bonn, 

 Germany. In order to do this work he resigned his position as in- 

 structor at Harvard University. His studies include cultures of the 

 Acrasiae and of the lyabyrinthuleae, which he had brought from 

 America. 



