43 S Biochemical News, Notes and Comment [June-September 



Utes this increase to the drug Crusades of the past 15 months, which 

 have increased the number of commitments of users of habit-form- 

 ing drugs as well as of persons convicted of selling narcotics 

 illegally. 



Fall in the production-cost of radium. Sec'y of the In- 

 terior Lane authorizes the statement that the production of radium 

 from Colorado carnotite-ores by the Bur. of Mines, in connection 

 with the Nat'l Radium Inst., has passed the exper, stage in its new 

 process and is now on a successful manufacturing basis. He says: 

 The cost of I gram of radium bromid during Mar., Apr. and May 

 of the present year was $36,050, This includes the cost of ore, In- 

 surance, repairs, amortization, allowance for plant and equipment, 

 cost of Bur.-of-Mines Cooperation, and all expenses incident to the 

 production of high-grade radium bromid. When it is considered 

 that radium (bromid) has been selling for $120,000 to $160,000 a 

 gram, it will be seen just what the Bur. of Mines has accomplished 

 along these lines. 



BoTANicAL NOTES. N. Y. Botüfi. Garden anniv. The 20th 

 anniv. of the opening of the N. Y. Botan. Garden was celebrated by 

 Amer. botanists at the Garden, Sept. 6-1 1. At the initial meeting, 

 the delegates and visitors were welcomed, on behalf of the B'd of 

 Managers, by Dr. W. Gilman Thompson, pres., and on behalf of 

 the Scientific Directors, by Dr. H. H. Rusby, chairman. 



Relation of botany to medicine. " The most important develop- 

 ment of modern biology came when the great principle of the exist- 

 ence of cells was transferred from botany to zoology by Theodor 

 Schwann, at the beginning of the iQth Century. When Virchow took 

 the further step of applying the cell-doctrine to pathol., he made per- 

 haps the greatest advance in modern medicine. He used to declare 

 in later life that when these two far-reaching developments were 

 made by himself and Schwann, the rising generation of scientific 

 investigators in Germany were quite as much interested in botanic 

 Problems as in microscopic anatomy. It was this breadth of interest, 

 he declared, that gave them the larger outlook which enabled them 

 to see beyond the bounds of what had been hitherto known, to newer 

 phases of knowledge." Jour. Amer. Med. Assoc, 1915, Ixiv, 

 p. 2142. 



