February 17, 18. The New Quantum Mechanics: Dr. E. 66 11. Some Characteristics of Solar and Stellar Atmospheres: Dr. Charles E. St. John. April 1. Doublet Separation and Fine Structure of the Balmer Lines of Hydrogen: Dr. Norton A. Kent, professor of physics, Boston University. 66 8. Absolute Intensities of Lines in the Pure Rotation Spectrum of HCl: Dr. R. M. Badger. 18. "Newton": Professor H. H. Turner, of Oxford University, England. 22. The Scandium Spectrum: Professor Henry Norris Russell, of Princeton University. 29. Theory of Precision Clocks and other Regenerative Systems: Mr. V. H. Benioff. May 6. On the Theory of Compton Effect: Dr. P. S. Epstein. "13. Recent Research in Line and Band Spectra: Dr. L. A. Sommer, of the University of Göttingen. 20. The Theory of the Davisson-Germer Experiment: Drs. C. Eckart and F. Zwicky. "27. The Shift of Spectroscopic Lines with Pressure: Mr. H. D. Babcock. June 3. Some Evidences as to the Ultimate Nature of Magnetism: T. D. Yensen. Photo-electric Fatigue: F. L. Poole. THE INTERNATIONAL GEODETIC AND GEOPHYSICAL UNION THE list of delegates and guests of the American Geophysical Union to, the third general assembly of the International Geodetic and Geophysical Union which meets at Prague from September 3 to 10, includes: Dr. Louis A. Bauer, director, Department of Terrestrial Magnetism of the Carnegie Institution of Washington, accompanied by Mrs. Bauer. Dr. William Bowie, chief of the division of geodesy of the U. S. Coast and Geodetic Survey, accompanied by Mrs. Bowie and their adult son. Dr. J. H. Dellinger, senior physicist of the radio section of the U. S. Bureau of Standards, accompanied by Mrs. Dellinger. Commander N. H. Heck, chief of the division of terrestrial magnetism and seismology, U. S. Coast and Geodetic Survey. Mr. W. D. Lambert, mathematician of the division of geodesy, U. S. Coast and Geodetic Survey, accompanied by his sister, Miss Mary B. Lambert. Dr. R. A. Millikan, director of the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena. Dr. Harry Fielding Reid, professor of dynamic geology of the Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore. Professor L. C. Graton, of the department of geology, Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass., will attend as a guest. The following resolutions were adopted by the American Geophysical Union during its eighth annual meeting on April 29: RESOLUTIONS ON TRANSLATIONS OF REPORTS ON SEISMOLOGICAL INVESTIGATIONS PUBLISHED IN THE JAPANESE LANGUAGE (Submitted by Section of Seismology) Whereas, It has become known that the reports of much of the seismological investigations carried on in Japan will hereafter be published in the Japanese language only, and Whereas, This procedure is calculated to deprive most of the American students in this field of research of the advantages of this literature, be it Resolved, That this matter be brought to the attention of the National Research Council in the hope that the council may provide that this literature be rendered into English, also that provision be made whereby mimeographed copies of these translations be supplied investigators at research institutions gratis and to business concerns, insurance companies, and others interested at cost, and Resolved, Further, that, should such an arrangement be feasible, a committee of the Geophysical Union be empowered to make a choice of the material to be so translated and distributed. THE BUREAU OF CHEMISTRY AND SOILS OF THE U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE DR. CHARLES ALBERT BROWNE, chief of the bureau of chemistry of the United States Department of Agriculture, has been designated acting chief of the new Bureau of Chemistry and Soils, which takes form July 1. Dr. A. G. McCall, of the University of Maryland, has been selected to head the department of soils and will take the place of Professor Milton Whitney, who has headed this work since its organization in the department, but who is now obliged, on account of ill health, to relinquish exacting administrative duties. Professor Whitney will devote himself to writing up results of important investigations on which he has been engaged for many years. A. G. Rice, assistant to the chief of the Bureau of Soils, has been given the same position in the new bureau. Dr. McCall was a member of the scientific staff of the Bureau of Soils from 1901 to 1904. He left the Department of Agriculture to become assistant professor of agronomy in the Ohio State University and was soon made head of that department, holding the position until 1916 when he became head of the de partment of soils and geology in the University of Maryland. Maryland was the first state to start soil survey work and the first to complete it. The work was started under Professor Milton Whitney and completed under Dr. McCall. Dr. McCall received his B.Sc. degree from the Ohio State University in 1900 and his Ph.D. from the Johns Hopkins in 1916. He is a member of the Society of Agronomy, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Society for the Promotion of the Agricultural Science, and of many other scientific and agricultural organizations. He was executive secretary of the First International Congress of Soil Science recently held in Washington, and has been active in promoting soil science as a writer and investigator. The new Bureau of Chemistry and Soils combines the research divisions of the old Bureau of Chemistry, the Bureau of Soils, and the Fixed Nitrogen Research Laboratory. The regulatory work formerly carried on by the Bureau of Chemistry has been combined with the regulatory work in the Insecticide and Fungicide Board and all will be administered in the new Food, Drug and Insecticide Administration. The Civil Service Commission recently held an examination for the position of chief and assistant chief of the newly created bureau. From the list of eligibles the secretary of agriculture expects soon to select the permanent head. Dr. Browne has expressed a desire to devote his energies to chemical research, but has consented to handle the general administrative work temporarily. SCIENTIFIC NOTES AND NEWS DR. ELIAKIM HASTINGS MOORE, professor of mathematics in the University of Chicago, a past president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, has received the degree of doctor of science from the University of Kansas. Northwestern University, where Dr. Moore was formerly professor of mathematics, also conferred on him the doctorate of science as "a productive scholar whose publications are marked by their originality, finished character and far-reaching significance; the recognized leader among American mathematicians." THE University of Michigan on the occasion of the recent commencement conferred the degree of doctor of science on Dr. Alexander Ziwet, for many years professor of mathematics in the university and professor emeritus since 1925; and on Dr. Willis Rodney Whitney, since 1901 director of the research laboratories of the General Electric Company. DR. JAMES M. ANDERS, professor of medicine in the University of Pennsylvania, received the degree of doctor of science on the occasion of the commencement exercises of Bowdoin College. DR. ALEXIS CARREL, of the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research, has been elected correspondent of the Paris Academy of Sciences in the department of medicine and surgery. AT Princeton University Professor Edwin Grant Conklin has been appointed Henry Fairfield Osborn research professor of biology; Professor K. T. Compton, Cyrus Fogg Brackett research professor of physics, and Professor Hugh Scott Taylor, David B. Jones research professor of chemistry. PROFESSOR F. G. DONNAN, professor of general chemistry in the University of London, has been elected a member of the Royal Academy of Sciences of Amsterdam, filling the vacancy caused by the death of Professor C. Golgi, of Pavia. THE University of Oxford conferred the honorary degree of D.Sc. upon Sir Robert Hadfield, Bart., and Dr. Richard Willstätter, professor of chemistry in the University of Munich, on June 30. Nature reports that the Senatus Academicus of the University of Edinburgh has agreed to offer the degree of doctor of laws to the following, for conferment at the special graduation ceremonial on July 20, on the occasion of the visit to Edinburgh of the British Medical Association: Lord Dawson, of Penn, physician in ordinary to His Majesty the King; Dr. A. Donald (Manchester); Dr. C. E. Douglas (Cupar); Sir William Hale-White (London); Mr. R. G. Hogarth (Nottingham); Dr. W. Hunter (London); Dr. T. H. Milroy (Belfast); Sir Berkeley Moynihan, Bart. (Leeds); Sir J. H. Parsons (London); Sir Humphry Rolleston, Bart. (Cambridge); Dr. G. F. Still (London); Mr. W. Trotter (London); Sir Almroth Wright (London); Professor Vittorio Ascoli, professor of clinical medicine, Rome; M. Jules Bordet, director of the Pasteur Institute, Brussels; Dr. Harvey Cushing, professor of surgery, Harvard University; Dr. C. L. Dana, professor of nervous diseases, Cornell University; Professor Knud Faber, professor of medicine, University of Copenhagen; Dr. Jan van der Hoeve, professor of ophthalmology, University of Leyden; Dr. Otto Meyerhoff, professor of physiology, University of Berlin; Dr. Otto Naegeli, professor of medicine, University of Zurich; Dr. W. S. Thayer, professor emeritus of medicine, Johns Hopkins University, and M. T. M. Tuffier, Academy of Medicine, Paris. THE International Anesthesia Research Society presented on May 16 to Dr. Arno B. Luckhardt, professor I of physiology, University of Chicago, and T. Bailey Carter, D.Sc., a scroll of recognition in appreciation of "meritorious research in anesthesia and analgesia, and for prolonged, untiring and resultful experimental laboratory studies of the biochemistry and pharmophysiopathology of ethylene, as well as such splendid cooperation of pure with applied science as enabled the surgeons, specialists and anesthetists of the Presbyterian Hospital (Chicago) to rapidly establish the clinical use of ethylene as a new and valuable routine method of anesthesia for the benefit of suffering humanity." THE Cross of Knight of the Czechoslovak Order of the White Lion, a decoration for citizens of foreign states in appreciation of their services rendered on behalf of Czechoslovakia, has been awarded to the following American engineers by the Czechoslovakian Government: Professor Joseph W. Roe, head of the Department of Industrial Engineering, New York University; Calvin W. Rice, secretary of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers; Alfred D. Flinn, director of the Engineering Foundation, New York; Lawrence W. Wallace, executive secretary of the American Engineering Council, Washington; H. S. Person, managing director of the Taylor Society, New York, and Morris L. Cooke, an industrial engineer of Philadelphia. DR. JOHN JOHNSTON, previously chairman of the department of chemistry of Yale University, on July 1 took up his work as head of the new research department of the United States Steel Corporation. He intends to spend several months visiting various plants and studying metallurgical problems and practices, after which he will organize an adequate research laboratory. It has not yet been determined where it will be established. PROFESSOR ARCHIBALD VIVIAN HILL, F.R.S., who recently returned to England after having lectured during a semester in Cornell University, has been elected honorary fellow of King's College, Cambridge. SIR RICHARD T. GLAZEBROOK, formerly director of the British National Physical Laboratory, has been appointed a member of the Advisory Council for Scientific and Industrial Research. DR. DONALD B. VAN SLYKE, of the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research, has been elected president of the Harvey Society for the ensuing year. THE recently elected officers of the American Society of Plant Physiologists for the year 1927-28 are: President, Charles A. Shull; vice-president, William E. Tottingham. The secretary-treasurer, elected last year for a term of two years, is Scott V. Eaton. At the annual meeting during the last week in June of the Society for the Promotion of Engineering Education at the University of Maine the following officers were elected: President, R. L. Sackett, Pennsylvania State College; vice-presidents, C. E. Magnusson, University of Washington, T. E. French, Ohio State University; secretary, F. L. Bishop, University of Pittsburgh; treasurer, W. O. Wiley, of Messrs. John Wiley and Sons. DR. GEORGE K. BURGESS, director of the Bureau of Standards, was elected president at the twentieth National Conference on Weights and Measures held at the Bureau of Standards from May 24 to 27. PROFESSOR G. S. WHITBY, of McGill University, has been elected president of the Canadian Institute of Chemistry for 1927-8. PROFESSOR THEODORE W. RICHARDS, of Harvard University, and Professor James F. Norris, of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, have been appointed honorary chairman and honorary vice-chairman, respectively, of the committee in charge of the seventy-sixth meeting of the American Chemical Society, which will be held in September, 1928, at Swampscott, Mass., under the auspices of the Northeastern Section. The general chairman is Dr. Gustavus J. Esselen, Jr., vice-president of Skinner, Sherman and Esselen, Inc., Boston, Mass., and the executive secretary is Professor Lester F. Hamilton, of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. AT the recent Annual Convention of the Association of Cereal Chemists held in Omaha the following officers were elected: President, Mr. Leslie R. Olsen, The International Milling Co., Minneapolis, Minn.; vice-president, Mr. C. E. Mangels, North Dakota Agricultural College, Fargo, N. D.; secretary-treasurer, Mr. R. K. Durham, The Rodney Milling Co., Huntzinger Bldg., Kansas City, Mo.; editor of Cereal Chemistry, Dr. C. H. Bailey, University Farm, St. Paul, Minn.; business manager, Mr. C. G. Ferrari, University Farm, St. Paul, Minn. Mr. Roland J. Clark was appointed by Mr. Olsen as chairman of the Association's Committee on Publicity. AT a meeting of the Board of National Research Fellowships on May 27 and 28, the following additional appointments were made: Reappointments: Bacteriology, Albert Haldane Gee; Botany, R. E. Girton, L. Joseph Klotz and Lewis E. Wehmeyer; Psychology, Harry R. De Silva, M. F. Metfessel, R. H. Seashore; Zoology, C. Dale Beers, Margaret R. Murray, E. A. Swenson and R. L. Zwemer. New Appointments: Botany, James M. Fife, Frederick H. Frost and M. B. Linford; Psychology, C. P. Heinlein and Louis William Max; Zoology, F. W. Appel, D. 777 R. Briggs, F. J. Brinley, Robert H. Luce and Jack Schultz. DR. P. W. ZIMMERMAN, dean of the College of Agriculture at the University of Maryland, has accepted a position on the staff of the Boyce Thompson Institute for Plant Research at Yonkers, New York. He will have charge of the experimental work in vegetative propagation. Propagation problems have become very urgent for American nurserymen and horticulturists, especially in view of the quarantine which will be in full operation by 1930. R. H. BELL, who has been assistant director of agricultural extension work at State College, has been appointed director of the Bureau of Plant Industry in the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture at Harrisburg. DR. RALPH C. P. TRUITT, director of the department for the prevention of delinquency of the National Committee for Mental Hygiene, has been appointed director of the clinic of the Mental Hygiene Society of Maryland, to which a grant of $23,000 was recently made by the Commonwealth Fund. MISS RUTH ATWATER, who for the last four years has had charge of the foods courses at Skidmore College, Saratoga Springs, New York, serving during the last year as director of the department of home economics, has been appointed director of the Bureau of Home Economics of the National Canners Association. DR. CHARLES G. ABBOT left Washington on June 1 for Mt. Wilson, California, where he will continue his work on the stellar energy spectra, and on the solar cooker. He will probably return about October 1. THE Tropical Plant Research Foundation has undertaken an investigation of the physiology, bark anatomy, and latex flow of the sapodilla tree and tapping problems connected with the production of chicle, supported by the Chicle Development Company of New York. Dr. John S. Karling, of the department of botany of Columbia University, is leaving for British Honduras to carry on the field work. PROFESSOR JOHN W. HARSHBERGER, professor of botany in the University of Pennsylvania, sailed for South America on July 2, to conduct botanical study on the vegetation of that country. He will visit the tropical rain forest, the Araucaria forest of Brazil, the pampa of Argentine, the high Andes of Chili, the Antarctic forest of southern Chili, and on his return homeward, attention will be given to the lomas of the west coast of Peru. DR. O. A. REINKING, pathologist of the United Fruit Company, Boston, has returned to the United States after two and one half years of exploration in the Philippine Islands, Southern Asia, India, Indo-Malaysia and Australasia relative to securing disease resistant varieties of bananas. PROFESSOR DR. A. FUJINAMI, of the Kyoto Imperial University, has been appointed as exchange professor and has left Japan for South America to study sanitary conditions in Brazil. DR. Y. SATA, formerly president of the Osaka Medical College, has been nominated exchange professor to Germany, and will give lectures on tuberculosis in several universities there. He also carries several reels of films produced by the education de partment showing ancient Japanese martial arts. SIR FREDERICK KENYON delivered the Romanes lecture of the University of Oxford on June 17. He took as his subject "Museums and National Life." DR. J. L. COLLINS, of the division of genetics, University of California, has returned from Vancouver, British Columbia, where he was invited by the Canadian Society of Technical Agriculturists to deliver two lectures on Experimental Genetics and Genetics in its Relation to Breeding. DR. JOHN B. DEAVER, Philadelphia, was guest of honor at the dinner of Medico-Surgical Society of New York, on May 21, when he spoke on "Preventive Measures against Gastric Ulcer and Malignancy." DR. CHARLES E. ST. JOHN recently gave a lecture on "The Evidence and the Bearing of the Theory of General Relativity" at Amherst College, and at Cornell University under the Schiff Foundation. He also spoke before the Physical Colloquium of Cornell University on "Some Characteristics of Solar and Stellar Atmosphere." THE fiftieth annual convention of the Pennsylvania Forestry Association met at West Chester on June 28, under the presidency of Dr. Henry S. Drinker, president-emeritus of Lehigh University. MR. GEORGE EASTMAN, of Rochester, has given $1,500,000 to establish a dental dispensary in London, England, which will be associated with the Royal Free Hospital. It probably will be much like the Rochester Dental Dispensary, Rochester, N. Y. The agreement provides that the British friends of the project raise funds to defray the running expenses of the institution. The activities of the dispensary are to be confined to a definite district in London which has a population of about 600,000, mostly poor and middle class persons. MR. J. PIERPONT MORGAN and Mr. William H. Mattieson have provided funds for a world survey of epidemic encephalitis. With this object in view, a commission has been appointed consisting of Dr. Haven Emerson, professor of public health administration, Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons; Dr. Frederick P. Gay, professor of bacteriology, Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons; Dr. William H. Park, director, bureau of laboratories, New York City Health Department; Dr. Josephine B. Neal, director of research. A 1,750-ACRE forest tract, situated not far from Ithaca, has been given to Cornell University by the heirs of Mathias H. Arnot, of Elmira. The tract will be under the supervision and management of the department of forestry of the university and will be used for purposes of research, demonstration and instruction. The major part of the tract is in Schuyler County, although its northern end is in Tompkins County. It lies in the watershed of the Susquehanna River. A FIELD meeting of the Southern California Rift Club was held on Sunday, May 29, in the Narrows of the Cajon Pass between the San Gabriel Mountains on the west and the San Bernardino Mountains on the east. It was attended by over a hundred members and friends of the club, and was called to order by the president, Dr. Levi F. Noble, who introduced Professor J. P. Buwalda, of the California Institute of Technology, at Pasadena. Professor Buwalda gave a general account of the great San Andreas rift belt, which traverses the pass obliquely from west-northwest to east-southeast, and on which a displacement in the San Francisco region caused the earthquake of 1906; he emphasized the numerous sub-parallel faults which the belt includes in its width of a mile or more, and explained that, in consequence of complex movements upon them, many great slices and slabs of rock, more or less crusted by the pressure and friction to which they have been subjected during their displacement, are now found in discordant relation to each other and to the rock on either side of the belt. Professor W. M. Davis, of Harvard University, next spoke with especial regard to the contrast between rifts of the San Andreas type, which have nearly rectilinear traces, and on which movements with a large horizontal movement seem to predominate, and rifts of the Wasatch type, traces of which show a succession of concave bights separated by cusps and on which movements with a large vertical component prevail. Professor Davis also called attention to the importance of establishing monuments on the two sides of certain rifts at selected points, in order that future displacements may be detected. After a picnic lunch, Dr. Noble led the party up the nearby mountain slope, whence the course of the rift for several miles in both directions was pointed out, and where several great rock slabs of diverse composition and of large displacement in the rift belt were examined. THE first zoological garden for Prague is to be established in Troja, one of the outer suburbs. Plans for the completion of the buildings extend over many years; but the exhibition of birds and animals is to be completed as soon as possible. Funds for this enterprise are being obtained partly by the formation of a company and partly by state aid. The total is estimated at about 2,000,000 crowns. THE authorities of the Province of Saskatchewan are making arrangements for the preparation of a comprehensive geological air survey of the northern part of that province, according to advices to the Department of Commerce from Assistant Trade Commissioner W. J. Donnelly, at Montreal. The project, it is said, will be undertaken for the purpose of determining the mineral wealth of the district to be surveyed and, when the maps are completed, the mineralized areas will be indicated as an aid to prospectors interested in that region. PRESIDENT COOLIDGE, by recent executive order, has set aside nine tracts of land in Alaska as game and bird preserves. Certain areas along the Alaska Railroad have been set aside as a preserve and breeding ground for muskrats and beavers, and a tract of 14 square miles about the government hotel at Curry, Alaska, which is also on the railroad, a refuge for the protection of wild birds and game and fur-bearing animals. In the area at Curry fishing will be regulated by the secretary of commerce; and the hunting and trapping of birds and game and fur-bearing animals, other than brown and grizzly bears, wolves and wolverines, will be permitted only under regulations to be prescribed by the secretary of agriculture, in accordance with the Alaska game law. THE report of the committee presided over by Lord Lovat, which was appointed by the British Colonial Office Conference to make recommendations in regard to the establishment of a Colonial Scientific and Research Service, has been issued. The cost of such a service is estimated to be £175,000 a year. The committee proposes that a council should be set up under a chairman appointed by the Secretary of State for the Colonies, a director and deputy director and the following members: The director of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew; the director of the Imperial Bureau of Entomology; the director of the Imperial |