NOVEMBEE 4, 1910] 



SCIENCE 



627 



ace C. Porter and F. K. Ovitz, conducted their 

 investigations at the Pittsburgh station while 

 it was under the technologic branch of the 

 Geological Survey, the work being a continua- 

 tion of the fuel investigations begun several 

 years ago at the Louisiana Purchase Exposi- 

 tion, St. Louis, Mo. The results obtained at 

 that plant showed that the work of determin- 

 ing the fuel values of the coals and lignites 

 in the United States with a view to increasing 

 efficiency in their utilization would be incom- 

 plete if it did not include systematic physical 

 and chemical researches into the processes of 

 combustion. Hence in their later investiga- 

 tions the authors carried on such researches, 

 concentrating attention on those lines of in- 

 quiry which promised results of economic im- 

 portance. This bulletin is a report on an 

 investigation of the volatile matter in several 

 typical coals — its composition and amount at 

 diilerent temperatures of volatilization. 



UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL NEWS 

 The state legislature of Arkansas has ap- 

 propriated $350,000 for the erection of four 

 agricultural schools and $500,000 additional 

 has been raised by the cities. 



At the recent meeting of the board of di- 

 rectors of Washington University it was an- 

 nounced that a research laboratory in connec- 

 tion with the chair of pathology and thera- 

 peutics in the dental school has been endowed. 

 A well equipped laboratory will be in thorough 

 working order at the beginning of the annual 

 session, October 1, 1910. Dr. Hermann Prinz, 

 who has filled the chair of dental pathology 

 and therapeutics for the past ten years, has 

 been chosen to take charge of the new labo- 

 ratory. 



At a recent meeting of the board of regents 

 of West Virginia, the College of the State 

 University was discontinued, and a depart- 

 ment of medicine in the College of Ai-ts and 

 Sciences was established. This department 

 will, as heretofore, offer the work of the first 

 two years of the medical course, but the uni- 

 versity wiU not award the degree of M.D. to 

 those of its students who complete the last 



two years in medicine at certain other colleges, 

 as has hitherto been done. This preliminary 

 medical work will be improved, and may be 

 counted towards the degree of B.S. 



At the College of Agriculture of the Uni- 

 versity of Wisconsin and the Wisconsin Agri- 

 cultural Experiment Station Dr. Ormond S. 

 Butler has been appointed instructor in horti- 

 culture to give his entire time to research 

 work. Dr. Butler received his doctor's degree 

 at Cornell in 1910 where he specialized in 

 plant physiology. Dr. Frank B. Hadley has 

 been appointed assistant professor of veter- 

 inary science. Assistant Professor E. E. 

 Jones has been granted leave of absence for the 

 second semester to study soil physics and 

 drainage in this country and abroad. Conrad 

 Hoffmann, assistant in agricultural bacteriol- 

 ogy, who has been on leave of absence for a 

 year studying soil bacteriology, in Germany, 

 has returned and is giving a course in soil 

 bacteriology. 



Mrs. Helen Thompson Woolley is assist- 

 ing in the department of philosophy of the 

 University of Cincinnati this winter. 



Dr. W. B. Pillsbury, of the University of 

 Michigan, has been advanced to a fuU pro- 

 fessorship of psychology. 



DISCUSSION AND CORRESPONDENCE 



THE MENDELIAN THEORY OF HEREDITY AND THE 

 AUGMENTATION OF VIGOR 



To THE Editor of Science: One of the 

 most interesting questions in connection with 

 the Mendelian theory of heredity is whether 

 the augmentation of vigor observed in cross- 

 ing distinct varieties can be explained on the 

 hypothesis of the pure gamete. 



The following mathematical treatment of 

 the subject may be of interest to some of your 

 readers. 



The most general expression for a Mendel- 

 ian family breeding true to its mean is 

 (^p'(DD) +2pq{DR) +^{RR))n 



for, if the array of individuals obtained by 

 expanding this expression be crossed at ran- 

 dom, we get the same expression for the array 

 of offspring generation after generation. 



