538 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XLVII. No. 1222 



from malnutrition, due to their living on 

 poorly constituted diets, and also to greater 

 efficiency in the use of feeding-stuffs in animal 

 production. 



Our solution of the problem of successfully 

 feeding diets of purified foodstuffs together 

 with the two unidentified food essentials, fat- 

 soluble A and water-soluble B, greatly simpli- 

 fied the study of the problem of isolating the 

 latter substances. Indeed without it the study 

 of this problem can scarcely succeed. My as- 

 sociates and I have further simplified the prob- 

 lem of their isolation by the demonstration 

 that similar " protecting " substances do not 

 exist for the diseases scurvy and pellagra. It 

 had become a widely accepted belief that there 

 existed not less than four such imknown 

 dietary essentials, one for the prevention of 

 beri-beri, another each for scurvy, pellagra and 

 for rickets. This belief rested on the "vita- 

 mine " hypothesis of Funk. I need not here 

 dwell upon the important studies of Eijkmann, 

 Fraser and Stanton, Stepp, Hoist, Funk, "Wil- 

 liams, Osborne and Mendel, and of Goldberger, 

 a critical study of whose papers greatly aided 

 us in the planning of our experimental diets 

 and in the interpretation of our results. 



During my stay at the University of Wis- 

 consin nobody had anything to do with in- 

 dependent work with my rat colony, except in 

 a small way an independent study was carried 

 on by Mr. V. E. Nelson during the months just 

 preceding July, 1917. I reiterate my state- 

 ment in my reply to Professor Hart in Science 

 for March 8, that the work which they charged 

 I had made dishonest use of, which was par- 

 ticipated in by Mr. Steenbock, was planned 

 entirely by me, and was carried out by him as 

 directed, in the capacity of an assistant. He 

 was not consulted about the interpretation of 

 the data in the paper by MoCollum and Sim- 

 mouds (Jour. Biol. Chem,., January, 1917), be- 

 cause his personal iattitude towards me before I 

 left Wisconsin made impossible a joint prepara- 

 tion of the paper, and he was therefore given 

 credit for the preparation of the materials em- 

 ployed in the experiments instead of being 

 made joint aiithor, as I should have been glad 

 to have made him under other circumstances. 



When one leaves an institution after having 

 made observations of a fundamental character, 

 and having for several years made use of these 

 in the development of new and important lines 

 of research, his colleagues who remain behind 

 have, of course, a right to continue investiga- 

 tion in this field, just as any one located else- 

 where has the right to take advantage of the 

 observations of others, and attempt to further 

 the acquisition of knowledge. There is no 

 property right in research or its results so long 

 as it is incomplete and not protected by patent. 

 Some proceed on this theory, attempting the 

 while to perfect details, and to add some ele- 

 ment of originality, and to give their work the 

 mark of independent thought. Others prefer 

 to spend their time in making experiments of 

 an exploratory character, at the risk of doing 

 much unprofitable work in order to make some 

 observation which will open up a new field of 

 investigation which they may follow with 

 profit. A few prefer to attempt to bring into 

 disrepute some investigator who has opened up 

 a new field of research when he has reached a 

 point where much further work remains to be 

 done, which is obvious to every one who studies 

 his published results, in the hope that they 

 may thereby so discredit him that his work will 

 be interfered with, with a view to making 

 possible the reaping of a harvest of opportunity 

 which his absence from the field would make 

 possible. Many believing that the author of 

 the first important observation has the right to 

 be allowed to develop the new field without an- 

 noyance, refuse, from a sense of self-respect, to 

 pounce upon, and, in haste, complete what an- 

 other is doing, when a study of fundamental 

 nature makes possible a new type of investiga- 

 tion. Judgment as to which course one should 

 pursue will, of course, be determined by the 

 standards of the individual. 



E. V. McCOLLUM 

 Baltimore, Md. 



THE WORLD'S CALENDAR 



To THE Editor of Science: A communica- 

 tion by W. J. Spillman in Science of May 17 

 discloses the fact that a bill was introduced in 

 the Congress on April 16 with the object of 



