Apeh, 26, 1907] 



SCIENCE 



675 



only more subject to frost, but the winter 

 temperature is lower than for the mountains." 

 This is a common result of inversions of 

 temperature, generally noted in mountainous 

 regions everywhere. 



RAILROADS AND VEGETATION IN THE TROPICS 



One of the chief difficulties in the main- 

 tenance of way along railroads in the moist 

 tropics is the constant struggle against 

 tropical vegetation. This is also a source of 

 great expense. Along the Tehuantepec Rail- 

 road, as pointed out by Dr. E. 0. Hovey 

 (Bull. Amer. Geogr. Soc, February, 190Y), 

 mechanical means have proved inadequate, 

 although they are still used, and the railroad 

 company has adopted a chemical which is ap- 

 plied, from a tank car, at a high temperature 

 and under pressure, by means of a steam 

 sprayer. This kills the roots, as well as the 

 superficial growth. 



Bulletin 59, New Mexico College of Agri- 

 culture, by J. D. Tinsley, contains the meteor- 

 ological observations taken at the experiment 

 station between 1892 and 1905; also the re- 

 sults of temperature and rainfall observations 

 at various stations in the Mesilla Valley for 

 most of the years 1851-1890, previously pub- 

 lished in Gen. Greely's Report on the Climate 

 of New Mexico some years ago. 



Dr. W. N. Shaw, director of the British 

 Meteorological Office, has been appointed 

 reader in meteorology in the University of 

 London. 



E. DeO. Ward 



EXPERIMENTS ON HUMAN NUTRITION 

 The Carnegie Institution of Washington 

 has for several years been interested in the 

 study of problems in human nutrition, which 

 it has aided with grants. One of its first 

 undertakings in that line was in connection 

 with the investigation carried on by Pro- 

 fessor W. O. Atwater, at Middletown, Conn., 

 in cooperation with this department, the work 

 being continued under his successor. Dr. P. G. 

 Benedict. This joint effort has been directed 

 to increasing the efficiency and precision of 



the respiration calorimeter, previously de- 

 veloped with the aid of this department, and 

 especially to providing the oxygen annex, 

 making it a closed-circuit apparatus. 



So great has been the interest of the institu- 

 tion in this work and its belief in the possi- 

 bilities open to it, that it has decided to 

 establish it as one of its permanent lines of 

 research and to provide a special laboratory 

 for it, as has already been done for a few 

 other lines. The nutrition laboratory will 

 probably be located in New York, in con- 

 nection with one of the large hospitals, and 

 will be devoted particularly to inquiries in 

 relation to medicine, physiology and hygiene. 

 The fitting up of the apparatus and laboratory 

 will be in charge of Dr. Benedict, who will 

 direct the subsequent investigation. 



There are many problems concerned with 

 nutrition in disease and convalescence, and 

 with the energy output and hence the food 

 requirements of the body under various patho- 

 logical conditions, as well as many questions 

 of ventilation and other branches of hygiene, 

 to the study of which the respiration calorim- 

 eter is especially adapted. Such questions 

 have a wide interest and are of far-reaching 

 importance, and as the department's researches 

 have developed there have been urgent re- 

 quests that they be taken up. They are, how- 

 ever, distinctly separate from the investiga- 

 tions of the nutritive value of agricultural 

 food products, to which the department's ef- 

 forts have been directed, and have seemed 

 rather to belong to some other agency than 

 one working primarily in the interests of 

 agriculture and looking to annual appropria- 

 tions for continuation. 



It is especially gratifying, therefore, to all 

 interested in the subject of nutrition in its 

 broadest aspects, that the Carnegie Institu- 

 tion should have recognized its importance 

 and decided to provide for it as one of its 

 special departments of research. It is thus 

 given greater permanency and greater free- 

 dom in scope than could be the case under 

 legislative appropriation, and the- possibilities 

 are opened for extending the investigation 

 into theoretical lines where it is much needed. 



Especially is this departure gratifying to 



