Januauy 8, 1004.] 



SCIENCE. 



73 



conspicuous plants are Aragalus arctica, A. 

 nigrescens, Ghamwcestus procumhens, Dra- 

 pensia Lapponica, Lloydia serotina. Campan- 

 ula lasiocarpa. Arnica lassingi and various 

 dwarf arctic willows. Vaccinium uliginosum 

 and V. Vitis-Idwa are abundant and their 

 fruits are of great economic importance to the 

 natives. 



The paper brought out an interesting dis- 

 cussion lasting till the hour for adjournment. 

 F. S. Eaele, 

 Secretary. 



RESEARCH CLUB OF THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN. 



The regular October meeting was held on 

 the evening of the twenty-first. Dr. Eaymond 

 Pearl discussed the problem of the * Eelative 

 Variability of Man and Woman,' and pre- 

 sented statistical evidence of two sorts, bear- 

 ing on the subject. (1) It was shown that 

 with respect to age at death from fatal con- 

 genital malformations woman was signifi- 

 cantly more variable than man. The stand- 

 ard deviation in age at death for men was 

 2.104 years, while for women it was 2.699 

 years, giving a difference of .595 year with a 

 probable error of ± .044. The mean age at 

 death was not significantly different in 'the 

 two sexes. Since there is a positive correla- 

 tion between {a) the degree or intensity of 

 malformations sufficiently great to cause 

 death, and (6) the age at which death occurs, 

 it was maintained that these results give evi- 

 dence as to the relative variability of the sexes 

 with reference to, the degree or intensity of 

 fatal malformations, and indicate a slightly, 

 but significantly, greater variation in the fe- 

 male. 



(2) It was shown from an analysis of 

 Marchand's data on human brain-weights that 

 with reference to this character the female 

 was slightly more variable than the male. 



These results are in accordance with Pear- 

 son's main conclusion from a study of the 

 relative variability of the sexes with respect 

 to a large number of physical characters. 



Professor E. D. Campbell read a paper on 

 ' The Diffusion of Sulphides through Steel.' 



Ten years ago the author had determined 

 the diffusion of sulphide of iron through steel. 



and later he found that to effect diffusion the 

 sulphide must be an oxysulphide. 



That steel should be permeable to liquids 

 even when heated to 1,200° C. was considered 

 so unlikely that Professor J. 0. Arnold, of the 

 University Technical College of Sheffield, 

 England, repeated a portion of the work, and 

 confirmed the results. 



In September, 1902, H. Le Ohatelier, of 

 L'Ecole des Mines, Paris, with M. Ziegler pub- 

 lished a paper in which they denied the per- 

 meability of iron, stating that the escape of 

 the sulphide of iron was entirely by capillary 

 action through the space between the steel 

 plug and the sides of the hole containing the 

 sulphide. Professor Campbell described a 

 series of experiments in which the sulphide 

 was contained in a long steel tube closed at 

 one end with a tapered screw plug, and heated 

 in such a way that it was impossible for sul- 

 phide to escape around the plug. When the 

 steel tubes were heated above 1,200° C. a por- 

 tion of the sulphide was found to have pene- 

 trated the solid walls of the steel tube, thus 

 confirming the author's first contention, that 

 steel when heated to about 1,200° C. is per- 

 meable to oxysulphide of iron without increase 

 in the per cent, of sulphur in the steel. 



The November meeting occurred on the 

 eighteenth. Mr. G. 0. Higley described 'A 

 Method for Determining the Excretion of 

 Carbon Dioxide from the Lungs.' The exist- 

 ing methods for measuring the amount of car- 

 bon dioxide in the expired air do not permit 

 a study of the character of sudden changes 

 such as occur at the beginning and at the end 

 of vigorous muscular work, nor such changes 

 as accompany the ' secondary rise ' in the 

 pulse rate as described by Bowen (memorial 

 volume of contributions to medical research 

 dedicated to Victor C. Vaughan, 1903). In 

 Mr. Higley's method the expired air, after 

 removal of moisture, is freed from carbon 

 dioxide in an apparatus charged with soda 

 lime, and suspended upon the arm of a bal- 

 ance. A long, light lever attached to the end 

 of the beam greatly magnifies the" movements 

 of the beam, and writes the curve of carbon 

 dioxide excretion upon the blackened paper of 

 a kymograph drum. On the same drum may 



