558 EXPEEIMENT STATION RECORD. 



The art of horae candy making {Canton, Ohio, 1913, 3. rev. ed., pp. 110, 

 figs. 24)- — Detailed directions are given for making candy at home, in most 

 cases tlie sorts usually thought of as commercial candies. 



Electric cooking', W. H. Alabaster (Elect. Rev., 13 (1913), pp. 451-454; al)S. 

 in Sci. Ahs., Sect. B— Elect. Engin., 16 (1913), No. 192, p. 590).— The author 

 discusses and summarizes in tabular form data regarding the amount of energy 

 required with electrical ovens of different makes to secure a temperature of 

 400° F. and maintain it for li hours, and regarding the comparative efficiency 

 of different sorts of hot plates when used to raise the temperature of 3 pints 

 of water to boiling, as well as the weekly cost of cooking for a family of two 

 adults and two children when different cooking devices are used. 



Retail prices, 1890 to October, 1913, F. C. Croxton (U. S. Dept. Labor, 

 Bur. Labor Statis. Bui. 138 (1914), pp. 160).— This publication, which is No. 12 

 of the Retail Prices and Cost of Living Series, and a continuation of earlier 

 w^ork (E. S. R., 30, p. 364), contains a summary of data regarding the retail 

 prices of food, coal, and gas, and the scaling weight of bread. 



Further notes on dietetics, A. Kakowski (Ther. Monatsh., 27 (1913), No. 4, 

 pp. 285-297; abs. in Hyg. Rundschau, 24 (1914), ^"o. 4, p. 237). — According to 

 the author's experiments, eating fungi (Boletus edulis), even wholesome ones, 

 has a harmful effect in parenchymatous nephritis. 



The vitamins of food (Nature [London'i, 93 (1914), No. 2315, pp. 41, 42).— 

 A summary of data included in a lecture entitled a Grain of Wheat, delivered 

 by T. Johnson at the National Museum, Dublin, February 24, 1914. Rather 

 sweeping deductions are drawn from recently published work regarding the 

 occurence of vitamins in foodstuffs. 



Amino acids in nutrition and growth, T. B. Osborne, L. B. Mendel, et al. 

 (Jour. Biol. Chem., 17 (1914), No. 3, pp. 325-349, figs. 8).— In their introduc- 

 tion to the report of their experimental work the authors point out the necessity 

 for adding to and systematizing knowledge regarding the protein "building 

 stones " formed by the complete hydrolysis of the protein molecule. From theo- 

 retical considerations and experimental data they discuss the necessity for adding 

 the lacking "building stones" to a deficient protein, which the body can not 

 synthesize except from its own tissue. 



Distinction is made between maintenance and growth from a theoretical as 

 well as from an experimental standpoint. The necessitj^ for a certain amount 

 of maintenance protein to make good wear and tear is discussed and other theo- 

 retical considerations suggested. The body may maintain itself, as the authors 

 point out, on a kind of protein on which it can not make growth. Therefore, 

 growth, which involves the actual formation of protein substance, makes a 

 different kind of demand from maintenance only. For instance, the authors 

 have found gliadin sufficient to supply the nitrogenous material required for 

 maintenance over long periods of growth (E.. S. R., 28, p. 8G4). However, 

 gliadin would not suffice, as the sole protein, for growth, this and other experi- 

 ments being facilitated by the addition to the diet of butter fat (E. S. R., 30, 

 p. 560). In more recent work with laboratory animals (rats) the authors have 

 succeeded in promoting growth at a normal rate when a maintenance ration 

 containing gliadin as the sole protein was supplemented with lysin. 



The authors believe that their feeding trials, in conjunction with their " demon- 

 stration of the almost complete cessation of growth on diets containing only 

 lysin-free proteins, furnish the first and only conclusive demonstration that 

 lysin is indispensable for the functions of growth. They are supplemented by 

 further evidence of the same sort in which the necessity for the same amino 

 acid is brought out in connection with the zein of maize [see below], a protein 

 likewise devoid of lysin. . . . 



