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SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XLVII. No. 1220 



Professor J. H. Ransom, for eighteen years 

 in charge of general chemistry in Purdue 

 University, has resigned, his resignation to 

 take effeot at the close of the present academic 

 year. 



Dr. Elbert 0. Lathrop has resigned his 

 position as biochemist in the laboratory of soil 

 fertility investigations, U. S. Department of 

 Agriculture, to accept a research position with 

 the Jackson laboratory of E. I. du Pont de 

 IsTemours and Company of Wilmington, Del. 



Dr. John J. Tigert, head of the department 

 of psychology of the University of Kentucky, 

 has been granted leave of absence and will go 

 at the close of this year to France into army 

 T. M. C. A. work. 



Arthur Francis Buddington, A.B., M.S. 

 (Brown, '13), Ph.D. (Princeton, '16), an in- 

 structor in the department of geology at 

 Brown University, has been appointed a civil- 

 ian instructor in the non-flying section of the 

 aviation ground school at Princeton. 



Professor Francis G. Benedict, director of 

 the Carnegie ^Nutrition Laboratory in Boston, 

 gave an address before the medical staff of the 

 Base Hospital at Camp Devens, Ayer, Mass., 

 on May 3, 1918, on the subject " The cost of 

 overeating," based upon a research on under- 

 nutrition carried out with a group of twenty- 

 five men at the International Y. M. C. A. Col- 

 lege at Springfield, Mass. 



Professor George A. Hulett, of Princeton 

 University, gave recently a lecture on " Gas 

 warfare" at the University of Minnesota. 



Dr. J. A. Detlefsen, of the University of 

 Illinois, gave the annual address at the meet- 

 ing of the Kentucky Academy of Science on 

 May 4, on recent developments in genetics. 

 , A GROUP of students of man have formed a 

 " Galton Society " at New York City. A first 

 meeting of the charter fellows took place at a 

 dinner given by Professor H. F. Osborn, on 

 April 17. The other charter members are 

 Madison Grant, George S. Huntington, 

 Charles B. Davenport, C. H. Merriam, Wil- 

 liam K. Gregory, J. H. McGregor, Edward L. 

 Thorndike and Edwin G. Conklin. Addi- 

 tional members were elected as follows: Dr. 



Earnest A. Hooton, Gerrit S. Miller, Dr. Eay- 

 mond Pearl, Dr. Frederick Tilney, Dr. Clark 

 Wissler and Professor H. H. Wilder. It is 

 proposed to elect more members from time to 

 time up to twenty-five in number. Dr. Daven- 

 port was elected president and Dr. Gregory 

 secretary. 



The annual Norman Wait Harris Lectures at 

 Northwestern University, which were founded 

 to stimulate scientific research, have recently 

 been given by Professor Thomas C. Chamber- 

 lin, head of the department of geology at the 

 University of Chicago. The general subject 

 of the course was " Glaciers, ancient and mod- 

 ern," and the individual subjects were " Birth, 

 growth and mature stages of glaciers," " The 

 decadence, death and residual products of 

 glaciers," "Existing glaciation and the place 

 it gives the present epoch in the cycle of 

 climates." " The glaciation of the last geo- 

 logical period," " The glaciation of the earlier 

 geological ages," and " The assigned causes of 

 glacial periods; the climatic outlook." The 

 six lectures were given on successive nights to 

 large audiences, and a dinner in honor of the 

 lecturer was given at the University Club of 

 Evanston by the university trustees and mem- 

 bers of the faculty. 



A MEETING of the Botanical Society of 

 Washington was held on May 7. Abstracts of 

 the papers presented will be published in the 

 Journal of the Washington Academy of Sci- 

 ences. The program was as foUows: S. C. 

 Stuntz : an appreciation : Dr. R. H. True. Col- 

 lecting data on national forest range plants: 

 Wm. A. Dayton. Nathaniel Jarvis Wyeth 

 and his influence on western botany, with a 

 sketch of his return trip from Oregon in 

 1833; W. W. Eggleston. Papain from Carica 

 papaya grown in Florida : V. K. Chestnut. 



Professor John Henry Comstock, profes- 

 sor emeritus of entomology, Cornell Univer- 

 sity, lectured before the Syracuse Chapter of 

 Sigma Xi on April 1, on the habits of spiders, 

 and on April 20, Professor Charles H. Eich- 

 ardson, head of the department of mineralogy, 

 Syracuse University, lectured before the Cor- 

 nell Chapter of Sigma Xi on coal mining with 

 a camera. Both lectures were open to the 



