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National Resources Planning Board 



Trade Association Laboratories 



Imhistries confronted with many technical problems 

 are inclined to support technical research generously. 

 Trade associations within such industries generally 

 maintain their own research laboratories. These can 

 usually handle most of the types of research mentioned. 

 We find recorded in the Chamber of Commerce survey 

 that at least 36 trade associations maintain their own 

 research laboratories. These laboratories are manned 

 by staffs having a combined personnel of over 425 

 chemists, physicists, and engineers, and about the 

 same number of assistants without technical education 

 but with excellent experience and training in laboratory 

 technique. These laboratorj' staffs vary from some 

 numbering only a tcclmologist and one helper up to 

 others employing 116 scientists with a large number 

 of assistants. 



Research Promotes Consumption 

 of Canned Foods 



The National Canners Association affords an excellent 

 example of industry and public benefit derived tlirough 

 research carried on in an industry's own laboratory. 

 This trade association laboratory, founded in 1913, 

 was one of the first to engage solely in research. This 

 association maintains a central research laboratory in 

 Washington, with branches in the canning areas on the 

 Pacific coast and a traveling laboratory for use wherever 

 needed. In the early days of commercial canning, 

 spoilage of canned food was all too common. It was 

 ordinarj^ practice to add some chemical for the purpose 

 of preventing bacterial growth and resulting decomposi- 

 tion. The canning industry met and solved success- 

 fully difficult problems that arose from the fact that a 

 few types of canned foods seemed particularly sus- 

 ceptible to contamination by so-called "food poisons" 

 that were occasionally serious in their effects. 



When the canning industry established its research 

 laboratory, one of the ablest food chemists of the 

 country was placed in charge of it. This scientist had 

 until then been in charge of one of the Government 

 laboratories engaged in food research and regulatory 

 administration. Intensive studies were at once ini- 

 tiated on the methods necessary to insure the steriliza- 

 tion of canned foods without recourse to chemical pre- 

 servatives. Length of cooking and the temperatures 

 necessary to obtain complete sterility of containers of 

 every size were carefully determined for each type of 

 food product packed. Variations necessary in the 

 processing of acid as compared with nonacid foods were 

 carefully worked out. Lacquer linings for many types 

 of tin cans were investigated and individually developed 

 for use with each canned j)roduct likely l<> ad'ect 

 ordinary cans. Chemical changes occurring during 



canning and processing were studied with particular 

 reference to the vitamin content of the various foods. 



The industry quickly availed itself of the association 

 laboratory's findings and put its recommendations into 

 effect in processing. Spoilage of canned foods virtually 

 has become a thing of the past. The industry has 

 benefited in many ways; the expense of replacing spoiled 

 goods has been eliminated, and canned food products 

 of reputable manufacturers are now universally accepted 

 as sound and wholesome. The public has benefited 

 through having made available a very wide variety of 

 wholesome foods at lower costs, with danger to health 

 or life almost completely eliminated. No better example 

 of the value to be obtained from a trade association's 

 operation of its own technical research laboratory can 

 be cited. 



Paint and Varnish Research 



Another typical example of trade association research 

 is the work carried on by the scientific section of the 

 National Paint, Varnish and Lacquer Association, Inc. 

 This association has its home in an historic mansion in 

 the center of Washington wdiich contains its offices and 

 laboratories. 



Research in this organization follows four principal 

 lines: (1) Determining the actual causes of claimed 

 failures of the industry's products; (2) investigating 

 new oil-bearing plants; (3) examining new raw mate- 

 rials such as pigments, resins, and balsams; (4) evalu- 

 ating finished products of the industiy as to durability 

 and other physical properties in order to develop new 

 fields of use and to increase consumption. Analytical 

 work, publicity through lectures, and compilation of 

 pertinent references in the technical literature are also 

 a part of the scientific section's activities. 



The research work of this association is done by a staff 

 of eight members under the guidance of an advisory 

 committee of the association. It affords an illustration, 

 too, of some of the additional work that naturally 

 eventuates from research work. In 1939 the staff 

 wrote some 9,000 letters generally in answer to techni- 

 cal inquiries and entertained some 1,500 visitors, many, 

 if not most, of whom wished to discuss their technical 

 problems. 



Commercial Research Laboratories 



Numerous excellent commercial laboratories have 

 been established in this country. Their activities cover 

 not only the control of technical processes in privately 

 operated establishments, but research on practical 

 operating jjroblems and the conduct of independent 

 scientific research as well. Many important technical 

 processes have been discovered and perfected in 

 commerciiil laboratories. The alloy of nickel and 

 chromium, composing the heating elements of most of 



