NUTRITION LABORATORY.* 



Francis G. Benedict, Director. 



The Nutrition Laboratory is now firmly establishing itself as a 

 research center for work with several scientific institutions in Boston. 

 At present a respiration apparatus with accessories belonging to the 

 Nutrition Laboratory is installed in a special room provided for it by 

 the management of the New England Deaconess Hospital, this appa- 

 ratus being used chiefly for studying the metabolism of diabetics. The 

 trustees of the Massachusetts General Hospital have also set aside a 

 special room in which the Nutrition Laboratory has installed a respi- 

 ration apparatus with accessories for studying the gaseous metabolism 

 of normal infants; experiments have been made with this apparatus 

 almost daily for the past two years. More recently the trustees of the 

 Boston Lying-in Hospital have been interested in the researches, and 

 material for studying the metabolism of normal new-born infants has 

 thus been readily and rapidly acquired. 



Recently a special cable has been laid connecting delicate electrical 

 apparatus in the Nutrition Laboratory — such as the string galvanom- 

 eter and oscillograph — with certain research rooms in the new Thomas 

 Morgan Rotch Jr. building of the Infants' Hospital, which provides 

 facilities for studying by photographic registration the pulse-rate of 

 infants. By these intimate affiliations with other institutions a large 

 niunber of active workers interested in the problems of metabolism 

 are brought into closer touch with the Nutrition Laboratory. 



LABORATORY CHANGES. 



The approaches to the building have been improved by the laying 

 of tarvia pavements and granolithic sidewalks. The grounds in the 

 rear of the building have also been re-graded in accordance with the 

 plans of a landscape architect in harmony with the grounds of the 

 adjacent buildings. 



To provide for photographic registration, v^^hich was but tardily used 

 by this Laboratory in its research work, one of the basement rooms 

 has been reconstructed and a Thoma oscillograph permanently installed 

 for the study of the electrical action of the heart and other delicate 

 physiological activities which are best recorded photographically. 

 This room with its equipment has been placed in charge of Professor 

 H. Monmouth Smith, of the Laboratory staff. 



A special laboratory for the use of the Director has been constructed 

 and is being equipped with apparatus, so that hereafter the develop- 



♦Situated at Boston, Massachusetts. (For previous reports on work in nutrition, see Year 

 Books 2-12.) 



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