July 14, 1922] 



SCIENCE 



43 



UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL 

 NOTES 



By the will of Mrs. Ann M. Swift the Uni- 

 versity of Chicago and Northwestern University- 

 received a total of $200,000, while the Amer- 

 ican University of Washington receives $25,000. 



The Journal of the American Medical Asso- 

 ciation states that the sum of $2,500,000 has 

 been appropriated by the Dominican Order 

 which controls the University of St. Thomas 

 College of Medicine, Manila, for the erection 

 of a new concrete building, in which will be 

 housed all the colleges of the university, the 

 laboratories, the dispensary, the libraries, the 

 hall, the chapel and its offices, leaving the old 

 building which the university now occupies in 

 the "Walled City. The site for this new build- 

 ing will be on the outskirts of Manila. Con- 

 struction work will be started in a few months. 

 A university hospital for the practice of the 

 students of the college of medicine will be 

 erected on the same site. Dr. Jose Luis de 

 Castro is dean of the university. 



De. a. a. Hamerschlag, who has been presi- 

 dent of Carnegie Institute of Technology, 

 Pittsburgh, since it was established in 1903, has 

 resigned, effective on July 1. Dr. Thomas 

 Stockham Baker, secretary for the past three 

 years, and formerly director of the Jacob 

 Tome Institute at Port Deposit, Md., has been 

 appointed acting president. Dr. Hamerschlag 

 plans to enter business, with offices in Pitts- 

 burgh and New York, as adviser and con- 

 sultant to business organizations. 



Dr. George W. Corner, associate professor 

 of anatomy at the Johns Hopkins Medical 

 School, has been appointed head of the depart- 

 ment of anatomy in the new school of medicine 

 and dentistry now being organized at the Uni- 

 versity of Rochester, N. Y. 



The appointment is announced of Dr. Edwin 

 Bramwell to the Monerieif-Arnott chair of clin- 

 ical medicine at the University of Edinburgh, 

 in succession to the late Professor Francis D. 

 Boyd. Dr. Edwin Bramwell is a son of Dr. 

 Byron Bramwell, the distinguished Edinburgh 

 physician, and has made his reputation chiefly 

 in the study of diseases of the nervous system. 



At the University of Cambridge Mr. F. C. 

 Bartlett, St. John's College, has been appoint- 



ed reader in experimental psychology and 

 director of the Psychological Laboratory. 



DISCUSSION AND CORRESPOND- 

 ENCE 

 SOME SIMPLIFICATIONS OF MICRO- 

 SCOPICAL TECHNIQUE 



In handling large classes in histology and 

 allied biological subjects in which it is desir- 

 able to supplement loan series of slides by sec- 

 tions, given out for individual mounting, any 

 means of shortening or economizing the work 

 of preparation is usually welcome. During the 

 past three or four years I have hit upon and 

 practically tested out a number of such short 

 cuts which have proven exceedingly valuable. 

 Others have doubtless used the same or simi- 

 lar methods, but their worth may justify publi- 

 cation here. 



Among these are first, the substitution of 

 C. P. Acetone for the usual series of graded 

 percentages of alcohols for the hydration and 

 dehydration of sections when staining and 

 mounting. Each student is provided with three 

 slide bottles, labelled Nos. 1, 2, and 3, and 

 containing C. P. Acetone in two and Absolute 

 Acetone in the third. Through this series the 

 mounted sections are passed to and from the 

 stain, before clearing and mounting as usual. 

 Acetone mixes readily with water and with 

 alcohol, and the absolute acetone with xylene 

 or other clearing agents. It is especially valu- 

 able in applying the various blood stains to 

 sections, since it does not extract them, nor 

 affect them in any appreciable manner. It 

 may also be substituted for absolute alcohol 

 as a solvent for celloidin when imbedding in 

 the latter medium. Its high volatility and in- 

 flammable nature are dangers against which 

 the student should be explicitly warned. 



The second method is the staining of ribbons 

 of sections without removing the parafSne in 

 which the material was imbedded. The par- 

 affine ribbons are cut into convenient lengths, 

 f oated upon warm distilled water in a suitable 

 dish until flattened, cooled, and then trans- 

 ferred to the surface of the filtered stain in a 

 fiat dish, upon which they are left floating 

 until stained. The coiTect time of staining 

 can be readily determined by experiment. 



