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SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXVIII. No. 723 



clearly stated in the abstract of the present paper, 

 as published first at the Congress in Heidelberg, 

 August, 1907, and later in the proceedings of the 

 same which appeared in the various journals and 

 archives of physiology during the fall of the 

 same year. Since that time it is encouraging to 

 note that J. Loeb (Journal of Biological Chem- 

 istry, October, 1907) and J. Bernstein ( P/Zh^sj-'s 

 Archiv, 1908, CXXII., p. 129) have both thought 

 well enough of the idea to use it as a basis for 

 investigations in their own laboratories. 



The italics in the above quotation are in- 

 serted by the writers of this note, since the 

 word italicized renders the sentence in which 

 it occurs a deliberate misstatement. Mr. 

 Snyder's original communication, to which, 

 through some curious oversight, he omits to 

 refer either in this paper or in his paper in the 

 Zentralhlatt filr Physiologie (22: 1908, s236), 

 appeared in the University of California pub- 

 lications in 1905. 



We think it advisable to draw attention to 

 the fact, doubtless forgotten by Mr. Snyder 

 in the stress of scientific production, because 

 the statements quoted above would lead the 

 reader, unacquainted with the history of this 

 phase of physiological investigation, to sup- 

 pose that members of this laboratory had 

 utilized Mr. Snyder's results and views with- 

 out giving him the full credit which he de- 

 serves. The true situation is, however, exactly 

 the reverse, and it is for the purpose of re- 

 moving the stigma which has thus been placed 

 by Mr. Snyder upon the workers in this labora- 

 tory, that this short note is written. 



It can not fail to strike an observant reader 

 of Mr. Snyder's paper as very curious that he 

 does not in his " conspectus of the tempera- 

 ture coefficients of the velocities of all the 

 physiological actions determined up to the 

 present time " refer to the paper by S. S. Max- 

 well entitled " Is the Conduction of the Nerve 

 Impulse a Chemical or a Physical Process ? " 

 published in the Journal of Biological Chem- 

 istry, October, 1907, and this fact will appear 

 the more strange when the reader observes 

 that in the foot-note quoted above, on page 

 310 of Snyder's paper, this very publication is 

 alluded to as one of the investigations from 

 the laboratory of J. Loeb, which " it is en- 



couraging to note " has been based upon the 

 ideas of Mr. Snyder. From the wording of 

 this footnote it would appear that Maxwell 

 overlooked Snyder's publications and, in par- 

 ticular, omitted to refer to his publication 

 upon the transmission of the nerve impulse 

 published in April, 1907. So far is this from 

 being the case that a considerable proportion 

 of Maxwell's publication was devoted to a 

 criticism of this publication of Snyder's. The 

 most damaging criticism was, however, 

 omitted from Maxwell's paper out of regard 

 for Mr. Snyder. Should Mr. Snyder desire it, 

 however, that criticism can still be published. 



The actual succession of events which led to 

 the appearance of this series of publications 

 was, as far as this laboratory is concerned, as 

 follows : 



In 1903 Martin H. Fischer, at that time a 

 member of this department, translated Cohen's 

 " Physical Chemistry." In the fourth chapter 

 of this work Cohen reviewed the work of 

 Arrhenius and van't Hoff upon the tempera- 

 ture coefficients of chemical reactions, and 

 showed that the temperature coefficient of 

 various life-processes was that of a chemical 

 reaction-velocity. He also suggested that the 

 same principle might be found to apply in 

 many other physiological processes. 



The ideas thus expressed by Cohen led 

 Loeb to consider it advisable that a series of 

 investigations upon the temperature-coeffi- 

 cients of life-processes should be undertaken, 

 with the view of ascertaining whether these 

 processes are determined primarily by physical 

 or chemical agencies.^ For this reason he 

 assigned to Mr. Snyder, at that time a candi- 

 date for the degree of Ph.D., the problem of 

 ascertaining the temperature-coefficient of the 

 heart-beat, and urged him to present his re- 

 sults as his thesis for the degree. This origin 

 of his investigation is very clearly stated by 

 Mr. Snyder in his own words, as follows :' 



In his book on " Brain Physiology," Loeb men- 

 tioned the possibility that the heart beat might be 

 caused by a fermentative process which is going 



= Cf. Loeb, Vniv. of Calif. PuU., Physiol., 3, 

 1905, p. 3. 

 ^ Vniv. of Calif. PuU., Physiol., 2, 1905, p. 126. 



