August 7, 19 13] 



NATURE 



593 



paper on the subjecl appears in The Astrophysical 

 Journal (June, vol. xxxvii., No. 5), and the conclu- 

 sions at which he arrives can be best conveyed in his 

 own concise summan . Many prominences, by their 

 shapes or movements, seem to indicate the existence 

 of a horizontal current in the solar atmosphere. This 

 currem may have op'posite directions at different alti- 

 tudes in the same locality, ll may change its direc- 

 tion, just as the wind changes upon the earth. In 

 middle latitudes the average tendency for movement 

 is towards the poles. In high latitudes the tendency 

 is towards the equator. This tendency is more marked 

 in the northern than southern hemisphere. From 

 lat. 10° N. to io° S. the average tendency is from 

 north to south directly across the equator. The pre- 

 vailing directions mentioned above apply to promin- 

 ences of all heights. 



THE BRIGHTON MEETING OF THE 

 BRITISH MEDICAL ASSOCIATION. 



A MEDICAL congress, especially in view of the 

 wide development of specialism, rarely if ever 

 helps to bring to light a new discovery or to promote a 

 new theory, or at least to work out an application 

 in prai tice of some basic theoretic facts. It has, how- 

 ever, the importance of grouping together men who 

 work on widely different lines and are enabled 

 to exchange ideas in a favourable atmosphere. In so 

 far 1 he Brighton meeting of the British Medical Asso- 

 ciation was undoubtedly very successful. We had, 

 for example, a very interesting address by Prof. C. G. 

 Barkla, F.R.S., on the secondary X-ray radiations in 

 medicine, which, being delivered by a prominent 

 physicist, introduced an element of exact science into 

 empiricism of therapeutic applications. Prof. Barkla 

 gave a detailed description of the scattered, fluorescent, 

 and corpuscular rays. He reminded his audience that 

 all 1 hemical, therapeutic, and physical action attri- 

 buted to X-rays was due to the secondary radiation 

 of negative electrons. He pointed out that in order 

 to produce a definite effect in an organ there must 

 be a transformation of the energy of Rontgen radia- 

 tion into energy of corpuscular radiation, as well as 

 an absorption of the latter by the respective organ. 



The solid basis and irrefutable arguments of physics 

 could not be found or expected in the discussion on 

 anaphylaxis. This was opened by Prof. W. E. Dixon, 

 who entered into various details of the condition of 

 experimentally produced hypersensitiveness, describing 

 the 1 h.mges occurring in the muscular and circulatory 

 systems, and emphasising the significance of local 

 symptoms. When he came to declare his preference 

 for one of the three leading hypotheses as to the causa- 

 tion of the "anaphylactic shock," he declared himself 

 in favour of tin- ferment theory, because he regarded 

 the "classical" side-chain theory as a purely specula- 

 tive hypothesis, and the more recent "colloidal theory" 

 as still being" in its infancy, whereas he found the 

 ferment theory to be based on carefully recorded 

 gical facts. Prof. G. Sims Woodhead and 

 Dr. Myers Coplans gave examples of clinical condi- 

 tions which may he Kinked upon as similar to that of 

 experimental anaphylaxis. Prof. Woodhead made a 

 very interesting remark as to the possibility of explain- 

 ing some of the phases of pneumonia by the sensitisa- 

 tion of the system by the specific bacterial protein. 

 Hi also referred to the view largely held as to the 

 possibility of organs being specifically sensitised, as 

 11 i~i meed by the uterine muscle in eclampsia. 



Drs. Embleton and Thiele related the results of 

 cheir very remarkable experiments, which have shown 

 thru by sensitising laboratory animals bv injection of 

 bai 1 rial protein of purely saprophytic bacteria like 



SO. 2284, VOL. 91] 



/>'. mesentericus one may make them so highK sus- 

 ceptible that .1 subsequent inoculation ol live bacteria 

 of the same species will kill the animals under 

 symptoms of acute septicaemia, ["hese experiments 

 are undoubtedly of a very wide importance, as they 

 may help in producing typical specific disease condi- 

 tions in experimental animals naturalh refractive to 

 the infection produced by ordinary means. 



A less debatable basis for discussion was given by 

 Prof. George R. Murray, who dwelt on the import- 

 ance of internal secretion in disease in a masterl) 

 presidential address. He explicitly limited the name 

 of "secretion" to the useful products of glandular 

 activity which pass into the blood stream in order to 

 play some definite part in metabolism. Ductless 

 glands in particular act on other tissues by means 

 of "hormones," which excite definite forms of chem- 

 ical activity in cells for which they have a special 

 affinity. The glandular cells may form more than 

 one specific hormone; they may also produce "in- 

 hibitory hormones," i.e. substances which inhibit the 

 chemical activity of the tissue cells instead of exciting 

 them. He passed in review the consequences of an 

 insufficient as well as superabundant supply of gland- 

 ular hormones, and insisted particularly on the rela- 

 tions of the thyroid and pancreatic gland which tend 

 to inhibit each other. This, as proved by further 

 discussion, is one of the most important facts for the 

 practice, as it tends to explain the machinery of 

 diabetes and all forms of glycosuria. Dr. A. E. 

 Garrod, F.R.S., could not discover any basis for a 

 sharp differentiation of the diabetic and non-diabetic 

 glycosurias. In his belief the progress of research 

 was strengthening the viewpoint that the internal 

 secretion of pancreas was the almost only controller 

 of carbohydrate metabolism in the system. The pecu- 

 liar forms of glycosuria without a definite diseased 

 condition he tried to explain by a disturbed correlation 

 between the various glands of internal secretion. 



A general impression gained from all the various 

 discussions can be summarised in that the medical 

 profession is fully alive to the importance of "control" 

 experiments, that it errs rather in the application of 

 a severe criticism to its scientific contributions, and 

 keeps to the moral, "Prove all things, holding fast 

 that which, is good." 



II) PROGNATHIC AND PLANKTON OBSER- 

 VATIONS IX THE NORTH SEA. 



\\ " I- have received from the Board of Agriculture 

 ** and Fisheries the subjoined communication 

 relating to observations to be made in the North 

 Sea : 



The research vessel s.y. Hiawatha, chartered for 

 fishery research in the North Sea, left the Tyne on 

 Tuesday for the purpose of making certain practically 

 continuous hydrographic observations, at a fixed posi- 

 tion during the first fortnight of August. She will 

 be taking part in a coordinated research into the 

 movements of the great water masses in the North 

 Sea, and for this purpose she will drop her 

 anchor about 150 miles " E. by N. \ N." of Shields 

 and commence her work. Her labours will be identical 

 in aim and in the main in methods with researches 

 simultaneously carried out on board eight other 

 vessels, also at anchor, at positions which collectively 

 will permit of the study of conditions representative 

 of the hydrographic conditions over the whole of the 

 North Sea. 



Two of these other vessels will be research vc ssels 

 acting on behalf of Sweden and Scotland, the Swedish 

 vessel working in the Skagerak, the Scottish well to 



