October 20, 1923] 



NA TURE 



599 



issue is before us. This in its own words is a " Journal 

 of Radio Research and Progress," and wisely leaving 

 to the more popular type of paper, elementary matter, 

 broadcasting news, and doings of societies, con- 

 centrates upon articles on recent developments and 

 experimental research. For example, a new con- 

 nexion for valve generators, in which the oscillating 

 circuit IS connected between the grid and the filament, 

 is described in an article by E. W. Gill, and the 

 possibilities of the neon tube both as an oscillator 

 and a receiver are discussed by E. H. Robinson. 

 Another suggestive article deals with the correction 

 of distortion produced by amplification, especially in 

 the case of loud speakers. Notable among several 

 other important contributions is an account of 

 investigations of the Radio Research Board on the 

 fading of signals. Another way in which the pro- 

 prietors of the journal are encouraging research work 

 is in the maintenance of a laboratory and testing 

 service whereby readers' apparatus can be calibrated 

 and other electrical measurements made entirely 

 free of charge. The journal should be an important 

 help to workers in wireless and is entirely independent 

 of trade interests or other wireless organisations. 



Dk. a. Kossel, the well-known physiological 

 chemist of the University of Heidelberg, celebrated 

 his seventieth birthday on September i6 last. 



The Fothergillian gold medal and prize of the 

 Medical Society of London have been presented to Sir 

 Arthur Keith, Conservator of the Museum of the 

 Royal College of Surgeons. 



The Thomas Hawksley lecture of the Institution 

 of Mechanical Engineers will be delivered at the 

 institution on Friday, November 2, at 6 o'clock, by 

 Sir Westcott S. Abell. The subject will be " The 

 Mechanical Problems of the Safety of Life at Sea." 



We much regret to announce the death on October 

 10 of Dr. J.. A. Harker, F.R.S., at the age of fifty- 

 three ; of Dr. A. A. Rambaut, F.R.S., Radcliffe 

 Observer, Oxford, and late Royal Astronomer of 

 Ireland, on October 14, at the age of sixty-four ; 

 and of the Hon. Nathaniel Charles Rothschild, on 

 October 12, aged forty-six. 



The Council of the National Institute of Agri- 

 cultural Botany has appointed Mr. A. Eastham to be 

 Chief Officer of the Official Seed Testing Station for 

 England and Wales. Mr. Eastham, who studied 

 agriculture and botany at the Lancashire Agricultural 

 School, Cheshire Agricultural College, and the Uni- 

 versity of Edinburgh, completed his training in 

 Canada, where he specialised in agricultural botany. 

 Previous to his return to England, Mr. Eastham held 

 botanical and seed-testing appointments in Canada. 



Prof, W. D. Treadwell, of the Technical High 

 School, Ziirich, will lecture on " Electrometric 

 Methods in Analytical Chemistry " on November 2, 

 under the auspices of the Manchester sections of 

 the Society of Chemical Industry, the Institute of 

 Chemistry, the Society of Dyers and Colourists, and 

 the Manchester Literary and Philosophical Society. 



NO. 2816, VOL. I I 2] 



The fifth of the series of public lectures on " Physics 

 in Industry," being given under the auspices of the 

 Institute of Physics, will deal with the subject of 

 " Physics in the Textile Industries." It will be 

 delivered by Dr. A. E. Oxley, physicist to the British 

 Cotton Industries Research Association, at the 

 Institution of Electrical Engineers, Victoria Embank- 

 ment, London, on Monday, October 22, at 5.30 p.m. 



The sixth annual general meeting of the British 

 Association of Chemists will be held at the Chemical 

 Department, University of Birmingham, Bournbrook, 

 on Saturday, October 27. A chemical exhibit has 

 been arranged by Prof. G. T. Morgan, to precede the 

 meeting. The Society's annual dinner will be held 

 at the Queen's Hotel, Birmingham, during the 

 evening. The president. Dr. H. Levinstein, will take 

 the chair at both the general meeting and the dinner. 



According to a Press announcement, a " Mam- 

 moth's Shoulder Blade " has recently been landed 

 at Douglas, Isle of Man, having been brought up 

 in a trawl off Ramsey. The bone is supposed to be 

 the shoulder blade of a mammoth. From the back 

 to the end of the blade is 6 ft. ; the bone is 2 ft. 

 thick and more than 3 ft. wide. Lengthy accounts 

 were given of the mammoth, the period in which 

 it lived, etc. Photographs have been submitted to 

 Mr. T. Sheppard, of the Municipal Museum, Hull, 

 from which it is clear, as might have been expected, 

 that the " bone " was the skull of a whale. 



Recent issues of the Times (September 29 and 

 October 10) reproduce many interesting photographs 

 of the effects of the great earthquake in Japan. They 

 show how well some of the great public buildings in 

 Tokyo (such as the Metropolitan Police Station and 

 the Imperial Theatre) withstood the shock of the 

 earthquake, though they were afterwards destroyed 

 by fire. The magnitude of the sea-waves is repre- 

 sented by a photograph of a scow, or flat-bottomed 

 ferry-boat, thrown bodily on to the quay at Yoko- 

 hama. A third picture illustrates a not uncommon 

 effect of great earthquakes, that of railway-lines left 

 suspended in air while the bridge below has collapsed. 



A GRANT of 25,000/. has been made by the Develop- 

 ment Commission to the new Research Institute for 

 the investigation of animal diseases to be erected in 

 connexion with the Royal Veterinary College, Camden 

 Town, London. Sir John McFadyean, principal of 

 the College, will be the first director of the Institute. 



The report of the field work of the Smithsonian 

 Institution for the past year describes the manifold 

 activities of this important body. Accounts are given 

 of no less than twenty-two expeditions organised by 

 it and its branches ; they include geological explora- 

 tions in the Canadian Rockies : the use of the great 

 100-inch telescope at Mount Wilson Observatory in 

 connexion with a special vacuum bolometer and 

 galvanometer to measure the heat in the spectrum of 

 the brighter stars : an expedition to the North 

 Pacific Fur Seal Islands : the collection of Australian 

 fauna for the Museum, and a similar enterprise in little- 

 known parts of China : botanical investigation in the 



