456 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XLVII. No. 1219 



men in the service for temporary duty for the edu- 

 cation of these men and give them one month or 

 two months of lectures, and without disorganization 

 we could give our surgeons the absolutely necessary 

 instruction and all around service we have been 

 trying to develop in a more or less haphazard way. 



THE INTERALLIED SCIENTIFIC FOOD COM- 

 MISSION 



At an interallied conference, wliicli was 

 held last Ifovember in Paris, it was agreed, 

 according to the British Medical Journal, that 

 a Scientific Food Committee should be formed 

 containing two delegates from each of the 

 following countries : Great Britain, France, 

 Italy and America. This committee was to 

 have its permanent seat in Paris, and was to 

 meet periodically in order to examine, from 

 the scientific point of view, the interallied 

 program for food supplies. It was empowered 

 to make any propositions to the allied govern- 

 ments which it thought fit. The delegates ap- 

 pointed from the various countries were: 

 Great Britain : Professor E. H. Starling and 

 Professor T. B. Wood; France: Professor Ch. 

 Eichet and Professor E. Gley; Italy: Pro- 

 fessor Bottazzi and Professor Pagliani; Amer- 

 ica : Professor E. H. Chittenden and Professor 

 Graham Lusk. The first meeting of this 

 Commission was held in Paris on March 25, 

 and the following days. At their first sitting 

 the commission was received by M. Victor 

 Boret, minister of agriculture and food. In 

 his opening address M. Boret pointed out that 

 the object of the conference was to study the 

 best means of utilizing the very small food 

 resources at the disjposal of the allies so as to 

 effect an equitable distribution of the avail- 

 able food supplies among the allies, having 

 proper regard to the facts of physiology and 

 political economy. He sketched shortly the 

 work of the commission, and his suggestions 

 were embodied later in a series of questions 

 which were adopted by the commission as the 

 problems that would immediately occupy its 

 attention. The commission agreed to estab- 

 lish a permanent central secretariat in Paris, 

 M. Alquier being appointed secretary. In ad- 

 dition to the central secretariat it was agreed 

 that a secretary to the commission should be 



appointed in each of the allied countries. At 

 its meetings, which lasted till March 29, the 

 commission considered many important ques- 

 tions relating to the minimum food require- 

 ments of man, and to the production and dis- 

 tribution of food supplies. The commission 

 will reassemble at intervals, in Paris or in 

 some other of the allied capitals. Professor 

 Gley has stated that it will probably meet next 

 at Rome towards the end of this month. 



SCIENTIFIC NOTES AND NEWS 



Professor Dugald C. Jackson, of the depart- 

 ment of electrical engineering of the Massa- 

 chusetts Institute of Technology, has been 

 called to France as a major in the Engineer 

 Eeserve Corps. 



Professor Philip B. Woodworth, dean of 

 electrical engineering of Lewis Institute, Chi- 

 cago, has entered the government service as a 

 major in the aviation section of the Signal 

 Corps. 



Dr. H. E. Wells, professor of chemistry at 

 Washington and Jefferson College, has been 

 commissioned captain in the Chemical Service 

 Section of the National Army. 



Dr. George Winchester, professor of phys- 

 ics of Washington and Jefferson College, has 

 been commissioned first lieutenant in the avia- 

 tion section of the Signal Corps, and is now in 

 France. 



Mr. Lawrence Erickson has resigned an in- 

 structorship in botany in the IsTew York State 

 College of Agriculture and has enlisted in the 

 Coast Artillery. 



Dr. Lewis Knudson, professor of botany in 

 the Wew York State College of Agriculture, has 

 obtained a leave of absence and is now in Y. 

 M. C. A. work in France. 



Calvin H. Crouch, who for seventeen years 

 has been at the head of the mechanical engi- 

 neering in the University of ITorth Dakota, has 

 accepted a position at Mt. Holyoke, Mass., with 

 the Deane Plant of the Worthington Pump 

 and Machinery Corporation, which is making 

 war material for the government. 



J. Ansel Brooks, professor of mechanics and 

 mechanical drawing at Brown University, has 



