730 
NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL 
(/) Investigation in tissue cultures, grafting and regeneration, with a view 
to their surgical applications. 
{g) The protection of submerged timbers from depredations of ship worms 
and the prevention of the fouling of ship bottoms by attachment of marine 
organisms. 
8. Activities of the Committee on Zoology. — In carrying out some of these 
suggestions members of the Committee have recommended to the Govern- 
ment investigators trained in the study of certain important human parasites 
which are not widely known; one member of the Committee has offered his 
services for the study of intestinal flagellates which cause trench diarrhea; 
zoologists trained in microscopical technique and parasitology have been sent 
into medical and hospital service. The suggestion that at least one zoologist 
especially familiar with animal parasites should be assigned to the Medical 
Staff of each mobihzation camp has not been acted upon so far, but it seems 
to the Committee that this should be done as soon as possible. 
Some zoologists and zoological students have been cooperating in the cam- 
paigns against animal pests which have been organized by the Bureau of 
Entomology, the Biological Survey and by Commissions of certain States. 
Others have been employed by the Bureau of Fisheries in exploiting new 
sources of marine food and in devising new methods of curing and preserving 
food fishes. 
One member of the Committee has been making experiments in consulta- 
tion with naval officers, on new methods of protecting ship bottoms from 
fouling due to the growth of marine organisms. Several zoologists have been 
interested in the problem of utilizing gulls in locating submarines. It seems 
probable that by feeding gulls from a submerged submarine, practically aU of 
these birds along our coast could be trained within a brief time to hover over 
submarines and thus reveal their location. There is some reason to believe 
also that individual gulls could be trained to work from ships at sea to which 
they would return. In this connection the Commissioner of Fisheries writes: 
^'The great success of the Japanese in training wild cormorants for the serv- 
ice of man should be borne in mind." 
Finally, the members of the Committee in common with many other zoolo- 
gists, have been actively engaged in research and in the promotion of research 
chiefly in non-applied lines. Probably the output of zoological research in 
this country was never greater and the facilities for carrying on such work 
were never better than in the year preceding our entrance into the war; 
nevertheless conditions in these respects can be greatly improved and the 
Committee on Zoology of the National Research Council considers that one 
of its main functions is to prepare for research work in all branches of zoology 
in the period after the war. To this end one of the first duties of the Com- 
mittee wiU be to make a census of workers, laboratories, publications, fellow- 
ships, assistantships, etc., together with a list of the most general needs of 
