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SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. LIV. No. 1390 



it would not be profitable to try to discover 

 anything new about tbe chemistry of the 

 processes being carried on. 



Very rapid changes have been taking place 

 in this respect during the past few years. The 

 demand for research chemists in the indus- 

 tries has been stimulated by a variety of 

 causes : the desire, in many cases at the in- 

 stance of government, to increase output and 

 extend operations into new lines, the stimulus 

 to new enterprises aiiorded by the general 

 shortage of chemicals, and, perhaps most im- 

 portant of all, the conspicuous success which 

 has attended the efforts to solve various im- 

 portant and difficult chemical problems. It 

 is worthy of note in this connection that in 

 a number of instances discoveries of very 

 great practical importance to industry have 

 been made by university professors to whom 

 contact with industrial chemistry brought 

 about by war conditions was an entirely new 

 experience. 



Whatever other influences may have con- 

 tributed, the result is that the industries are 

 calling more insistently and for greater num- 

 bers of thoroughly trained and experienced 

 research chemists than ever before and in con- 

 sequence the universities and colleges of the 

 country, along with other research institu- 

 tions, are confronted with several very serious 

 problems. In the main the Ph.D. graduates 

 in chemistry, after completing their training, 

 go into one of three lines of work. Some 

 of them go into college teaching and in the 

 past this field has absorbed a very consider- 

 able proportion of them. Others whose liking 

 for pure research has been the determining 

 factor in their choice have gone either into 

 government service or to research institutions, 

 educational and others. This choice has usu- 

 ally entailed being content, at least for a pe- 

 riod of years, with a smaller financial return 

 for their work than might have been expected 

 in other fields. The remainder have gone into 

 industrial work. As a result of the rapidly 

 increasing proportion going into the last 

 named field, the colleges particularly are find- 

 ing it difficult and, in many cases, impossible 

 to secure the services of properly trained men. 



Those connected with graduate institutions 

 which are the source from which the colleges 

 draw their teachers are in the best position to 

 appreciate how serious the present condition 

 is. Many times during the past twelve months 

 the chemical department of the Johns Hop- 

 kins University has been compelled to reply 

 to urgent calls for teachers that there were 

 no men available. The seriousness of the situ- 

 ation is accentuated by the fact that, not 

 only do the industries want the best and mos* 

 promising men, but they are willing to pay 

 larger salaries than the colleges and univer- 

 sities, with their limited endowments, can 

 hope to pay and larger also than those obtain- 

 ing in government research laboratories. The 

 inducements offered by the industries are in 

 fact frequently attractive enough to win over 

 men all whose inclination is toward teaching 

 and pure research. 



There is another phase of the situation 

 which is equally serious. Not only are the 

 industries absorbing an undue proportion of 

 young graduates, so much so that the uni- 

 versities and colleges find it impossible prop- 

 erly to fill various teaching and research po- 

 sitions, but in a good many cases they have 

 invaded the research faculties in the univer- 

 sities themselves. To the university teacher 

 the temptation to enter the industrial field is 

 made very great by reason of the difficult eco- 

 nomic situation in which he finds himself. 

 The moderate increases in salary which have 

 been recently granted by most of the institu- 

 tions of the country have been entirely insuffi- 

 cient to offset the decreased purchasing power 

 of the dollar and the economic position of the 

 teacher, never particularly enviable, has been 

 for the past three years considerably worse 

 than formerly. The temptation to improve 

 their economic positions has induced a num- 

 ber of men to abandon their university careers 

 for industrial work, with consequent crippling 

 of the research work of the institutions con- 

 cerned. A perhaps larger number of univer- 

 sity professors of chemistry have adopted a 

 compromise. To supplement an inadequate 

 income they have been devoting their summer 

 vacations to industrial work, and in many 



