218 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XL VII. No. 1209 



At the meeting of the board of regents of 

 the University of Minnesota on January 18, a 

 proposal by E. 0. Kendall and Drs. "W. L. and 

 Charles H. Mayo to grant and convey to the 

 University of Minnesota certain rights under 

 letters patent of a discovery by Dr. Kendall 

 of an agent for the treatment of diseases, 

 which has been by him designated " Thyroxin," 

 was submitted, and it was voted to appoint 

 the president, T;he dean of the department of 

 medicine and Dr. Eowntree a committee to 

 consider the proposed agreement and report to 

 the board. 



UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL 

 NEWS 



By the will of General Horace "W. Carpen- 

 tier, a trustee of Columbia University, who 

 died on January 21, at the age of ninety-two 

 years, his residuary estate is divided between 

 Columbia University and Barnard College, 

 providing, it is said, over a million dollars for 

 each institution. Bequests are also made to 

 Columbia University of about $100,000 for the 

 Dean Lung department of Chinese and about 

 $200,000 to the medical school. Barnard Col- 

 lege receives $200,000 for scholarships, and 

 $100,000 is bequeathed to the University of 

 California. There are also bequests to hos- 

 pitals and for other public purposes. 



Following the monthly meeting of the Tale 

 corporation it was announced that Professor 

 Eusseill H. Chittenden had been reappointed 

 director of the Sheffield Scientific School for 

 a term of five years, as requested by the gov- 

 erning board. 



Professor William A. Eiley, since 1912 pro- 

 fessor of insect morphology and parasitology 

 in the college of agriculture of Cornell Uni- 

 versity, has been elected professor of parasitol- 

 ogy and chief of the division of economic zool- 

 ogy in the University of Minnesota, and will 

 take up his duties there at the beginning of 

 the next academic year. 



Dr. John H. Hamilton, of Albany, N. T., 

 has been called to the State University of Iowa 

 to succeed Dr. M. F. Boyd, as professor of 

 preventive medicine and state epidemiologist. 

 Mr. Thomas J. McCarter, M.A. (Texas, 

 1916), has been appointed professor of physics 



in North-Western College, vice Mr. C. C. Van 

 Voorhis, resigned. Mr. McCarter formerly 

 held a position in the faculty in the Univer- 

 sity of Texas and more recently with the Bu- 

 reau of Standards at Washington, D. C. 



Fred G. Allen, of Erie, Pa., a graduate of 

 the University of Toronto, has been appointed 

 assistant professor of electrical engineering at 

 Lafayette College to take the place left va- 

 cant by the resignation of E. D. Tanzer, who 

 has become assistant professor of electrical 

 engineering at the Georgia Institute of Tech- 

 nology. 



Dr. John T. Black, commissioner of health 

 of the State of Connecticut, and Dr. Walter 

 H. Brown, health officer of Bridgeport, have 

 been appointed lecturers on public health at 

 Tale University for the next year. 



DISCUSSION AND CORRESPONDENCE 



DIMINUTION OF THE ANTARCTIC ICE CAP 

 AND THE AMELIORATION OF CLIMATE 



In a recent number of Science, Marsden 

 Manson^ has directed attention to the highly 

 important scientific results of the Antarctic 

 expeditions under Captain Scott and Sir 

 Ernest Shackleton, and has succinctly stated 

 several broad generalizations based upon the 

 data thus obtained. From the majority of 

 these conclusions few glacialists would dis- 

 sent, but exception must be taken to the main 

 theme that the present diminution of the Ant- 

 arctic ice cap proves the climate of the world 

 to be undergoing a rise in temperature which 

 will enable the " moss of polar wastes " to 

 " be replaced by rye and wheat." 



The position of the margin of ice sheet or 

 valley glacier is a compromise between two 

 factors : the forward or outward motion of the 

 ice, and depletion resulting from melting or 

 from wave action. The ice front advances 

 when the former exceeds the later; it retreats 

 when the relations are reversed. Variations 

 in the rate of movement of the ice depend upon 

 changes in temperature and in supply of new 

 ice formed from snow. A dry glacier is a 



1 ■ ' The Bearing of the Facts Revealed by Ant- 

 arctic Research upon the Problems of the Ice Age, " 

 Science, N. S., Vol. 46, pp. 639, 640, December 

 28, 1917. 



