702 



NATURE 



[January 27, 192 1 



The Department of Scientific and Industrial Re- 

 search announces that the Research Association for 

 the British Jute Industry has been approved by the 

 Department as complying with the conditions laid 

 down in the Government scheme for the encourage- 

 ment of industrial research. The secretary of the 

 committee engaged in the establishment of this asso- 

 ciation is Mr. Frank S. Cathro, i Royal Exchange 

 Place, Dundee. 



The following lecture arrangements have been 

 made in connection with the Royal College of 

 Physicians of London : — The Milroy lectures (on 

 " Respiratory Efficiency in Relation to Health and 

 Disease ") will be delivered by Dr. Martin Flack on 

 February 17, 22, and 24; the Goulstonian lectures (on 

 " Glycaemia and Glycosuria") by Dr. G. Graham on 

 March i, 3, and 8; and the Lumleian lectures (on 

 " Some Points in the Etiology of Skin Diseases ") by 

 Dr. A. Whitfield on March 10, 15, and 17. The 

 lecture^hour in each case will be 5 o'clock. 



The physiological laboratory in the central offices 

 of the University of London at South Kensington, 

 of which the director is Prof. A. D. Waller, appears 

 to be in some risk either of extinction or of mutilation 

 by removal to another site. The London County 

 Council, possibly under misapprehension as to the 

 present status of the laboratory, threatens to with- 

 draw the grant hitherto made, while the Senate of 

 the L^niversity requires the rooms in July for its 

 clerical staiT. If the grant ceases the laboratory is 

 to be closed. If it continues, or funds are pro- 

 vided from another source, the laboratory is to be 

 accommodated elsewhere than on its present site. A 

 letter of protest from Sir E. Sharpey Schafer has 

 been published in the Times, and resolutions in favour 

 of maintaining the laboratory in its present situation 

 have been passed by various bodies of physiologists. 

 It would be unfortunate if a valuable centre for re- 

 search were dismantled in order to find room for 

 work which could so much more easilv be done else- 

 ■where. 



We trust that an immediate inquiry will be insti- 

 tuted by the Ministry of ."Xgriculture and Fisheries into 

 the alleged effect of the discharge of oil from motor- 

 propelled vessels at sea, to which Sir Arthur Shiplev 

 has directed attention in the columns of the Times. 

 .\ccording to the Naturalist for January, gulls, razor- 

 bills, and guillemots have recently been picked up 

 along the Yorkshire coast dead or dving, their 

 plumage so saturated with oil that they were unable 

 to fly or dive. Moreover, sedentary forms of rock- 

 pool organisms are dying, and the inshore fisheries 

 suffering in consequence, codling, coalfish, and other 

 species haunting the inshore rocks being verv scarce 

 this year. It seems possible that unless remedial 

 measures are taken disaster may overtake our 

 fisheries. 



The United States Department of .Agriculture has 

 just issued a Circular (No. 135) directing attention to 

 the fact that unless fur-bearing animals are rigidlv 

 ■conserved, the time is not far distant when many of 

 the more valuable species will be exterminated. That 

 NO. 2674, VOL. 106] 



this is no alarmist's cry is shown by the fact that both 

 trappers and fur-dealers have urged the Government 

 to take immediate steps to promulgate protection in 

 the form of a close season and the infliction of penal- 

 ties for furs taken out of condition. It is suggested 

 that State Game Commissions and agricultural experi- 

 ment stations should promote the raising of fur- 

 bearers such as foxes, skunks, and musk-rats, and 

 that other species less amenable to captivity should 

 be conserved in sanctuaries. 



In the Kelvin lecture to the Institution of Elec- 

 trical Engineers on January 13, Sir William Bragg 

 gave an interesting and luminous account of the way 

 in which the study of the properties of the electron 

 has led to a better understanding of the structure of 

 the atom. His concluding remarks indicate that the 

 improvements he has been able to introduce into his 

 X-ray spectrometer have enabled him to establish the 

 fact that the atoms have different prdjjerties in dif- 

 ferent directions. This supports the theories of Lewis 

 and Langmuir that some of the electrons constituting 

 an atom do not participate in the orbital motion about 

 the nucleus which is characteristic of the electrons 

 of the Rutherford atom, as developed by Bohr and 

 Sommerfeld, but, on the contrary, are restricted to 

 certain portions of the outer surface of the system, 

 in which they describe small closed orbits and so 

 produce magnetic fields which serve as bonds of 

 attachment between atoms. 



In cc-operation with the .\ngIo-Batavian Society, 

 the University of London has made arrangements for 

 an interchange of lectures on medical subjects between 

 London and the Netherlands. The first lecture of the 

 series to be given by Dutch professors was delivered 

 by Prof. Wertheim-Salamonson, of Amsterdam, on 

 January 17 at the Royal Society of Medicine, the 

 Vice-Chancellor of the University of London presid- 

 ing. The subject chosen was "Tonus and Reflexes," 

 one to which the lecturer has devoted much attention. 

 The chief point discussed was the participation in 

 reflexes obtained normally, but especially in some 

 nervous affections, of that remarkable state of shorten- 

 ing into which voluntary muscles can be put by 

 certain conditions— a state in which no electrical 

 changes are to be detected and, as it appears, very 

 little, if any, chemical or thermal changes take place. 

 The lecturer was inclined to attribute the phenomena 

 to effects through the sympathetic supplv of muscle. 

 The ne.xt lecture will be given by Prof. Boeke, of 

 Leyden, on February 16, the subject being "The 

 Modes of Termination of Nerve-fibres in Muscle." 



A DISCUSSION, in which a number of kinema experts 

 participated, took place before the Illuminating 

 Engineering Society on January 18 on "The Use 

 and Abuse of Light in Studios for Kinema-film Pro- 

 duction." The making of films by artificial light 

 involves the use of illuminations vastly higher than 

 those usual in ordinary lighting, and cases have been 

 mentioned of alleged injury to the ey?s of actors 

 arising from exposure to verv powerful lights at close 

 quarters. The subject is being considered by the 

 Ministry of Health Committee on the Causes and 

 Prevention of Blindness, the chairman of which, the 



