t^EBRUARY 2 



1922 



NATURE 



255 



Calendar of Industrial Pioneers. 



Ipebruary 23, 1860. Joseph Miller died — Trained as 



lechanical engineer at Boulton and Watt's, Miller 



1822 with Barnes established one of the most suc- 



sful marine engineering works on the Thames. He 



ps a promoter of screw propulsion, and for H.M.S. 



'iphion built the first set of direct-acting screw 



;ines placed below the water-line. 



February 24, 1815. Robert Fulton died — Famous as 



pioneer of steam navigation in the New World, 



ItCMi was born in 1765, and in early life attained 



:ess as an artist. Afterwards in England and 



ince he turned to mechanical pursuits ; in 1800 he 



jstructed a submarine, and in 1803 experimented 



a steamboat on the Seine. He returned to 



jierica in 1806, and the following year built the 



rmont, which, driven by an engine constructed 



Boulton and Watt, ran successfully between 



York and Albany. Among other vessels built 



him was the Demologos, the first steam man-o'- 



Febrnary 24, 1875. Marc Seguin died — A nephew of 

 aeronaut Montgolfier, Seguin was the first to 

 istruct an iron-wire suspension bridge and one 

 the earliest of French railway engineers. In 1827 

 he invented the tubular boiler, and the same year 

 applied it to a locomotive for the railway from St. 

 Etienne to Lyons. He also made scientific investiga- 

 tions and endeavoured to develop the mechanical 

 theorv of heat. 



February 26, 1834. Alois Senefelder died -The inven- 

 tor about 1798 of the art of lithography, Senefelder, 

 who in his youth was connected with the stage, was 

 led to his discovery through seeking for a cheap 

 method of reproducing his comedies. He established 

 a lithographic establishment at Munich, and after- 

 wards was Director of the Bavarian Royal Litho- 



raphic Office. 



February 27, 1794. Jean Rudolphe Perronet died 



i'( rronet has been called the Telford of France. From 

 tlie office of the City Architect of Paris he entered the 

 (iovernment service, and in 1747 became the first 

 director of the Ecole des Fonts et Chauss^es founded 

 by Trudaine. He was the first to Introduce bridges 

 with level roadways, and among his most notable 

 works was the bridge across the Seine at Neuillv. 



February 27, 1913. Sir William Henry White died 



From an apprentice at Devonport Dockyard White 

 rose to be Chief Constructor of the Navy, a post he 

 held from 1885 to 1902. During this period he was 

 rt'six>nsible for the construction of 245 vessels costing 

 about ioo,ooo,oooZ. A great master of his profession, 

 he added much to the literature of naval architecture, 

 held the presidencies of various technical societies, 

 and was instrumental in forming the Royal Corps of 

 Naval Constructors. 



February 28, 1875. Sir Goldsworthy Gurney died One 



of the pioneers of the steam road carriage, Gurnev 



practised as a surgeon at Wadebridge and then in 



London. He was the inventor of the Drummond 



4ht, the steam blast, and a water-tube boiler, 



td in 1829 went from London tc, Bath in a steam- 



iven carriage at 15 miles an hour. 



March 1, 1911. Robert McAIpine died McAlpine is 



i;arded as the father of wood-pulp paper. Emi- 

 grating from Scotland to Massachusetts at the age 

 of sixteen, he mastered the business of paper-making, 

 and in 1867 produced the first sheet of paper made 

 from ground wood-pulp, the initial step in the pro- 

 duction of abundant supplies of cheap paper. 



E. C. S. 

 NO. 2730, VOL. 109] 



Societies and Academies. 



London. 

 Royal Society, February 16. — Sir Charles Sherring- 

 ton, president, in the chair. — L. Hill, D. H. Ash, and 

 J. A. Campbell : The heating and cooling of the body 

 by local application of heat and cold. When the 

 hands are heated or cooled by water the amount ol 

 heating or cooling is large, but not constant for a 

 given range of temperature. The degree of heating 

 or cooling is obtained from the temperature of the 

 skin over the median vein at the elbow, the thermo- 

 meter used being coiled and insulated from the air. 

 Loss of 20 to 25 kilo-calories of heat from the hands 

 in thirty minutes, i.e. a loss almost equal to the basal 

 metabolism, does not appreciably affect the body 

 metabolism.— J. B. Cohen, C. H. Browning, R. Gaunt, 

 and R. Gulbransen : Relationships between antiseptic 

 action and chemical constitution, with special refer- 

 ence to compounds of the pyridine, quinoline, acridine, 

 and phenazine series. Certain acridine derivatives, 

 salts of diamino-acridine and the methochloride of 

 this base, are extremely potent antiseptics. Pyridine 

 and quinoline derivatives (" fragments " of the acridine 

 molecule), a number of acridine derivatives, and some 

 phenazine compounds were also investigated, but none 

 approximate to diamino-acridine in antiseptic pro- 

 perties. Dealing with the acridine group, the presence 

 of amino-groups increases antiseptic power, and effec- 

 tiveness in serum is a characteristic of compounds with 

 unsubstituted amino-groups, and especially of their 

 methochlorides. Other radicals replacing the methyl 

 group in the methochloride do not alter the antiseptic 

 action, but substitution of alkyls in the amino-group 

 tends to diminish antiseptic action, while acetylation or 

 replacement of the amino-group destroys it. Antiseptic 

 action on organisms of different types shows marked 

 irregular variation. — D. T. Harris : Active hyperaemia. 

 The lingual nerve contains true vaso-dilator and the 

 svmpathetic vaso-constrictor fibres ; both are equally in- 

 dependent of the intervention of metabolites. Exf>eri- 

 ments show that increased blood-supply during mus- 

 cular activitv is due entirely to the products of meta- 

 bolism, and of the metabolites estimated carbon 

 dioxide and o-hydroxy organic acids were increased. 

 Vaso-dilator nerves are concerned with the control 

 of body temperature ; active hyperaemia in the dog's 

 tongue may be induced by reflex excitation of the 

 vaso-dilator nerves through the stimulation of heat 

 receptors in the skin. — B. B. Sarkar : The depressor 

 nerve of the rabbit. The depressor nerve of the rabbit 

 is connected in part with a special collection of 

 ganglion-cells in the vagus, distinct from the ganglion 

 of the trunk, which may extend into the superior 

 laryngeal or the vagus trunk. These cells probably 

 give rise to the afferent fibres of the depressor. The 

 nerve is usually formed by two branches, one from 

 the superior laryngeal and one from the vagus, and 

 is connected with the inferior cervical ganglion, the 

 root of the aorta, and the base of the heart. The left 

 nerve of the pair is generally larger and contains 

 more fibres than the right. The depressor contains 

 medium-sized and very fine myelinated fibres, and 

 others which are non-myelinated. Probably it is not 

 wholly formed of afferent fibres, for these fine 

 myelinated and non-myelinated fibres presumably 

 belong to the autonomic nervous system and are 

 efferent.— A. Lipschiitz, B. Ottow, C. Wagner, and 

 F. Bormann : The hyp>ertrophy of the interstitial cells 

 in the testicle of the guinea-pig under different experi- 

 mental conditions. Partial castration often causes 

 enormous hyi>ertrophv of the interstitial tissue. This 

 hvjxrtrophy is not compensatory, for the tendency to 



