8 University of New Hamtshike [Sta. Bull. o31 



because it represented the onl}- research project applying genetic 

 principles to the breeding and development of utility traits in farm 

 livestock. Further evidence of the interest in this research may be 

 cited in the request by the Agricultural Experiment Station at Roth- 

 amstead, England, for two stock rams of our hybrid strain. The 

 rams were sent and were used for continuation of research at that 

 station. One of our four-nippled rams heads a flock of purebred Suf- 

 folks in Kansas. ]!\Iore recently similar recjuests have been received 

 from an interior province of China, and from different parts of this 

 country. 



Genetics, like all other sciences, appeals most strongly to the pop- 

 ular imagination when it can have a direct application to every-day 

 problems. It is for this reason that it was selected by the Reader's 

 Digest as one of the significant attempts of research to promote 

 human welfare. This research, which still represents the only at- 

 tempt to apply a highl}" theoretical science to the practical improve- 

 ment of livestock, and has thus attracted national attention, appears 

 to have been justified by the results. 



Metabolism — A Study of the Energy Requirements for the 



Varied Activities of Life 



The research in animal nutrition carried out at this laboratory dur- 

 ing the last 23 years was begun originally as a War emergency proj- 

 ect. During the stress of the last great war the problem of conser- 

 vation of food resources became a matter of such primary concern 

 that practically every country was forced to apply measures re- 

 stricting the food intake of humans and of animals as well. In manv 

 countries undernutrition was the rule rather than the exception. 

 PhAsiological observations partly of a laboratory and partly of a na- 

 tion-wide nature were begun to determine the effect of insufficient 

 nourishment, for l:)Oth short and long periods, on the recuperative 

 abilitv of humans. As undernourished livestock are of no great eco- 

 nomic value an extension of this investigation to domestic livestock 

 became of vital importance also. 



Dr. F. G. Benedict of the Carnegie Institution of Washington, 

 grasping the practical significance of extending his studies of the 

 problem on humans to a study of undernutrition on livestock, pro- 

 posed to this laboratory a cooperative physiological research of the 

 problem. A one-year program Avith the joint resources of the nutri- 

 tion laboratory of the Carnegie Institution of Washingon and the 

 experiment station was thus begun. 



While the project as originally planned was limited to the solving 

 of one particular problem with a specific one-year time limit, this 

 was extended to another year to check the results under still more 

 critical laboratory control. 



The result was so unexpected as to challenge the validity of con- 

 cepts held at that time concerning the basal metabolism of cattle in 

 particular and possi1)ly of the comparative basal metabolism in gen- 



