maintain the patrol from March to July, as well as a close plotting of the drift-tracks of individual bergs. The result has been a great increase in knowledge of the interaction of the Labrador and Gulf Stream currents around the Grand Banks, which finally, we hope, will enable the drifts of bergs to be predicted to a much greater extent than is now possible.

Lieutenant Commander E. H. Smith, who has taken the oceanographic records and made the observations on the ice for the past few years, is now working up the hydrodynamic aspect of the results at the Geophysical Institute in Bergen.

HENRY B. BIGELOW MUSEUM OF COMPARATIVE ZOOLOGY, CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS

BRAYTON HOWARD RANSOM

DR. BRAYTON HOWARD RANSOM, chief of the zoological division, Bureau of Animal Industry, United States Department of Agriculture, died in Washington, D. C., at 11:00 p. m., on September 17, 1925, after an illness of about three weeks. He was only forty-six years old, a comparatively young man, but in the short space of that brief lifetime he had crowded more of valuable achievement than most men may hope for in the biblical allotment of three score years and ten. In the scope comprehended in his investigations he was quite unusual and in his grasp of the broad field of veterinary parasitology the writer would rank him next to the illustrious Railliet of Alfort, a much older man, retired from teaching a few years ago at the age of seventy.

It would be difficult to find another man who on the scientific side had done monographic systematic work on parasites and had established basic facts in the life histories of such important parasites as Ascaris, Haemonchus, Strongyloides, Gongylonema, Habronema, Syngamus and Taenia ovis, and who on the practical side had first found in the United States many of our economically important parasites, had contributed to our knowledge of the true pathological conditions or causes in the case of infestations with Davainea echinobothrida, Cooperia punctata, Syngamus trachea and Ascaris lumbricoides, had developed measures for the control of stomach worms in sheep and had originated and developed the famous swine sanitation system popularly known as the McLean County System, had developed the basic regulations of the United States Department of Agriculture for the control of parasites, especially trichinae and cysticerci, through the meat inspection service, and had established some of the fundamental facts on which dipping for cattle ticks is based. Such a man has nothing to do with the debates on pure science versus applied science; he sees only the field of sci

ence and does well the tasks before him. The investigations noted above are only the high lights selected from those represented in his bibliography of over 160 titles. This represents a quarter century of productive work. His bibliography is devoid of padding. He was not a dabbler. His most prominent characteristics were his extreme thoroughness and carefulness. He was painstaking to a degree, in spite of the fact that the responsibilities of life weighed on him unusually heavily and that he paid an excessive toll of nervous energy for this painstaking work.

Dr. Ransom was born in Missouri Valley, Iowa, March 24, 1879, and educated in the public schools of Bancroft, Nebraska. He received the following degrees: S.B., University of Nebraska, 1899; M.A., University of Nebraska, 1900; Ph.D., University of Nebraska, 1908. It was proposed by the University of Nebraska to confer on him the honorary degree of D.Sc. at the June commencement of this year, but owing to a misunderstanding he was unable to be present to receive the degree at that time. He was a fellow in zoology at the University of Missouri in 1900-1901 and at the University of Nebraska in 19011902. In 1902 he came to Washington as assistant in zoology in the Hygienic Laboratory of the U. S. Public Health and Marine Hospital Service and the following year succeeded Dr. Ch. Wardell Stiles in charge of the Zoological Laboratory of the federal Bureau of Animal Industry. In 1906 he was made chief of the laboratory and the laboratory was at that time made the zoological division. As chief of this division he became assistant custodian of the U. S. National Museum.

His sound counsel and scientific achievements were widely recognized among scientific groups. He was U. S. delegate to the Seventh International Zoological Congress, the Fourth Fisheries Congress and the First Pan-American Scientific Congress and a member of the editorial boards of the Journal of Parasitology and the American Journal of Tropical Medicine. He was a member of the American Microscopical Society (president), American Society of Naturalists, American Society of Zoologists, American Association for the Advancement of Science (fellow), American Society of Tropical Medicine (secretary-treasurer), American Veterinary Medical Association (honorary member), American Society of Parasitologists (councilor), Biological Society of Washington, Entomological Society of Washington, Helminthological Society of Washington (past president), Washington Academy of Sciences (vice-president), Société de Pathologie Exotique (foreign correspondent), Reale Accademia d'Agricoltura di Torino (foreign correspondent), Phi Beta Kappa, Sigma Xi, Beta Theta Pi and the Cosmos Club. In recognition of his work

on ascarids he recently had conferred on him the Gold Medal of the Seamen's and Tropical Diseases Research Association of Kobe, Japan.

As an executive Dr. Ransom was a man of vision in his attitude towards his problems and just, considerate and generous towards his associates in the laboratory. Although an outstanding figure himself, nevertheless he did not believe in the policy of a one-man laboratory consisting of a head surrounded by "dieners," and preferred to surround himself with scientific associates rather than with personal assistants. Under his supervision the zoological division bas had a steady and healthy growth from the time he took charge in 1903, and at the time of his death Dr. Ransom had a technical staff of six associates at Washington and four technical associates in charge of as many field projects at various places in the United States. His death is a personal loss to all his staff. They were devoted to his interests, deeply concerned when his health and life were imperilled, and have maintained throughout a high morale consistent with the obligations imposed by his kindly treatment and intelligent supervision.

What has been said of Dr. Ransom as a scientist and executive implies correctly what may be said of him as a man and as a friend. He did not maintain one attitude in his professional and executive capacity and another in his personal relations. In all his relationships he was uniformly courteous, kindly, helpful and considerate, and these qualities, coupled with a certain personal charm, ensured him the regard and admiration of all who knew him. It has developed during his last illness that he had many troubles and burdens which he kept to himself, and it is the one regret of his many friends that they could not have shared or lightened these burdens. With a dignified and quiet reserve he carried these to the end by virtue of an extraordinary strength of mind and fineness of character. That this man should have fallen beneath his burdens in the prime of life and achievement is a tragedy. The only consolations of his friends are that he leaves an unblemished record and that it is not always an unkindly fate that one is spared the vicissitudes of old age and the uncertainties of life. Whatever there may be of reward for life well spent, work well done and service to humanity that reward is his.

MAURICE C. HALL

HENRY ROSE CARTER

DR. HENRY ROSE CARTER, assistant surgeon general of the United States Public Health Service, a distinguished authority on yellow fever and malaria, died

at his home in Washington, September 14, following an illness of several months.

Dr. Carter was born in Caroline County, Virginia, August 25, 1852. In 1873 he received the degree of civil engineer from the University of Virginia, and in 1879 he took his medical degree at the University of Maryland School of Medicine. In May of the latter year he entered the Marine Hospital Service (now the United States Public Health Service) as assistant surgeon. Later he held the posts of surgeon and senior surgeon in this Service, and 'in 1915 he was appointed assistant surgeon general. From 1904 to 1909 he was director of hospitals of the Panama Canal Zone.

Dr. Carter's work has been mainly in the fields of yellow fever and malaria. His name is not so well known to the layman as the names of General Gorgas and Walter Reed, but he undoubtedly belongs with them in the small company of men who have made the most significant contributions to our scientific knowledge of yellow fever and methods of combating it. It was a suggestion from Carter that led Walter Reed to undertake the experiments in Cuba which resulted in the epoch-making discovery of the mosquito transmission of yellow fever. As an officer of the Public Health Service he took a leading part in banishing the disease from the United States.

Dr. Carter was one of the small group who began the fight against yellow fever in Panama in 1904. For the last ten years he has been closely identified with the campaign which the International Health board has waged for the complete eradication of this disease. In 1915 he served as a member of the Board's Yellow Fever Commission, headed by General Gorgas. Since 1920 he has been a member of its Yellow Fever Council. Because of his intimate acquaintance with the yellow fever work of the last three decades and his position as the leading authority on the subject, he was asked by the International Health Board to prepare a history of the disease and to this work he devoted most of his time for the last few years.

In the field of malariology Dr. Carter has long held, as an officer of the Public Health Service, the same position of preeminence that he enjoyed in relation to yellow fever. His opinion has been eagerly sought in everything related to problems of malaria control.

The officers of the International Health Board of the Rockefeller Foundation join with the United States Public Health Service and public health workers everywhere in lamenting the death of a man who has done so much to rid the world of the two dread plagues-malaria and yellow fever.

SCIENTIFIC EVENTS

SECOND CONFERENCE ON THE STANDARDIZATION OF BIOLOGICAL PRODUCTS1 THE second international conference on the standardization of biological products was held at Geneva from August 31 to September 3, under the presidency of Dr. H. H. Dale, F.R.S., of London, and was attended by seventeen representatives from various countries. The members of the conference were welcomed by Dr. Rajchman on behalf of the Health Section of the League of Nations. The main business of the conference was to discuss the standardization of such products as pituitary extract, insulin, digitalis, salvarsan, thyroid gland, ergot and others, and each of these was the subject of a good discussion, and resolutions were formulated which received the unanimous support of the conference.

The first product which received detailed consideration by the conference was pituitary extract, upon which a report was presented by Professor Voegtlin. After a somewhat lengthy discussion resolutions were arrived at, declaring that the dry (acetone) extracted substance of the fresh posterior lobe of the pituitary gland, which was recommended by Professor Voegtlin to the Edinburgh conference as suitable for adoption as a standard of activity for pituitary extracts, and which has since been adopted as a standard for this purpose in the United States Pharmacopoeia (tenth edition), should be now definitely accepted as the international standard, that the authority responsible in any country for biological standardization should prepare such quantities of the standard as were needed for distribution, and that the health organization of the league should be asked to furnish a small sample of the standard as originally prepared for examination by the Edinburgh conference to any authority which might require it for the confirmation of its own national standard.

Professor Macleod introduced the subject of insulin, and recommended the adoption as the international standard of the dried preparation of insulin hydrochloride which, at the request of the Edinburgh conference of 1923, has been made at the National Institute for Medical Research, London, 1 mg of this preparation to be regarded as containing 8 units of insulin. Professor Meyer mentioned a new method devised by Professor Loewi, of the University of Graz, depending upon, what Professor Loewi held to be proved, an alteration by insulin of the distribution of dextrose between the plasma and corpuscles of shed blood. It was agreed that this method deserved further careful investigation, but that no recommendation could yet be made as to its adoption. The recom1 From the British Medical Journal.

mendation made by Professor Macleod was agreed to, and it was arranged that the standard preparation should be kept by the Medical Research Council, which would undertake to test the permanence of its potency from time to time, and that samples of the preparation should be sent to some responsible organization in each country which would undertake its further distribution to testing laboratories.

The conference accepted the principle of the standardization of salvarsan and its derivatives in relation to permanent standard preparations, and Professor Kolle, of Frankfort, was asked to accept the responsibility of preparing, maintaining and distributing the standards for the various products of this class.

Thyroid gland preparations were also discussed, and it was agreed, on the suggestion of Professor Reid Hunt, to adopt the standard of iodine content. The question of ergot was introduced by Professor Trendelenburg, who said that, of a number of testing methods he had examined, a test based on the paralyzing effect of these alkaloids on the inhibitory action of adrenaline on the movements of the isolated intestine of rabbits and guinea-pigs appeared to be most promising. The conference decided that the question of the biological standardization of ergot was not yet ripe for final decision.

After various other substances had been considered, Professor Poulsson presented a memorandum dealing with methods proposed for standardizing for vitamin content the substances used in medicine for supplying vitamins to patients. He recommended the method already adopted in the United States Pharmacopoeia (tenth edition) for standardizing cod-liver oil for the growth-promoting factor (vitamin A). He stated that tests were already available, though less certainly quantitative in their interactions, for the antirachitic vitamin, the water-soluble growth-promoting vitamin and the antiscorbutic vitamin. A discussion ensued, in the course of which it was suggested by Dr. Dale that the present conference was hardly suitable for the discussion of the whole question of the biological standard of vitamins. It appeared to him that such a discussion could more suitably be undertaken by a special conference analogous to the serological conference, attended by recognized experts in this special branch of inquiry.

THE COLUMBIA-PRESBYTERIAN
MEDICAL CENTER

A REPORT on the progress of the fund to provide the Presbyterian Hospital's share of the cost of construction of the new Medical Center being erected at Broadway and 168th Street has been made public by Dean Sage, president of the hospital. Mr. Sage

said that a total of $6,250,000 had been received to date. The sum needed is $7,000,000.

In disclosing the status of the fund Mr. Sage revealed that a gift of $100,000 had been made anonymously a short time ago. Earlier several other substantial donations had been turned over to the fund by anonymous givers. Among the larger subscriptions of recent receipt were a gift of $5,000 from William D. Baldwin and one of $5,000 from Mr. and Mrs. A. R. Kuser, of Bernardsville, N. J.

Mr. Sage announced that the two gifts of $25,000 each made last spring by Miss Annie Burr Jennings and Mrs. Walter B. James had been made to establish two five-bed medical wards. The wards are to be memorials to "the distinguished services of Dr. Walter B. James to the Presbyterian Hospital and to medical science."

A committee has been formed drawn from the hospital Board of Managers and from friends of the institution to speed the raising of the $750,000 still required. The committee was named at a luncheon at the Downtown Association and the plans call for the raising of the sum before the winter.

A year ago when the Medical Center, which will be one of the finest of its kind in the world, took form, the hospital had on hand about $2,500,000 of the sum required. Columbia University, which joins in the establishment of the center, had its share ready. In a public appeal for help, which had as its goal $4,500,000, the hospital last winter raised the sum of $3,640,000.

The annual meeting of the Uptown Medical Center Association, Inc., was held on October 5, at the Washington Heights Chamber of Commerce, 1042 St. Nicholas Avenue. The association was formed by residents of the Heights section to collect $400,000, with which to build a floor in the hospital unit of the center and also to cooperate in any way possible in the construction of the entire plant. So far the association has raised more than $156,000.

The first unit of the center, a $10,000,000 building, which will house the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Columbia University and also the hospital, is now under construction. Ground was broken this spring and the building is expected to be ready for occupancy in 1927. The university is contributing $3,000,000 to erect its section of the building.

THE SHEDD AQUARIUM

A SPECIAL investigative mission for the Shedd Aquarium left Chicago on October 3 to study the construction, scientific and educational features and management of European aquariums with a view that the Shedd aquarium to be built in Chicago will be

an improvement over any existing institution of its kind.

The mission is comprised of Walter H. Chute, associate director of the Shedd Aquarium, and Leslie C. Stokes, engineer for Graham, Anderson, Probst & White, architects, who will draw the plans for the Chicago institution. They will be gone about two months. Immediately upon their return they will, in company with George F. Morse, director of the Shedd Aquarium, visit and make a similar study of American aquariums.

Mr. Chute and Mr. Stokes will, during their research, take into account both the mistakes and the desirable features of the leading aquariums of the world. Their findings and deductions will be incorporated in the plans to be drawn by Mr. E. R. Graham. European aquariums which will be visited include those at Naples, Monaco, Berlin, Antwerp, London, Leipzig, Dresden, Manchester, Plymouth, Blackpool and others..

At Naples special attention will be given to that aquarium's famous invertebrate collection. The Naples aquarium has been especially successful in keeping delicate species of marine life on exhibition. Methods used in handling them will be studied. The biological research laboratories of the Monaco institution will be especially studied there, and in Berlin the only artificial salt water system that has proved satisfactory will be investigated.

THE OPTICAL SOCIETY OF AMERICA

THE tenth annual meeting of the Optical Society of America will be held at Cornell University from October 29 to 31. In addition to a number of contributed papers and committee reports on such subjects as radiation, spectrometry, photography, physical optics, geometrical optics and physiological optics, there are two invited papers, one by Professor Simon H. Gage, of Cornell University, on "The microscope: Its development and some recent improvements," and the other by Professor E. M. Chamot, of Cornell University, on "Chemical microscopy: Its aims and possibilities."

There are two other important items on the program: Dr. H. E. Ives, of the Bell Telephone Laboratories, Inc., president of the society, will deliver his retiring presidential address on "Some photographic problems encountered in the transmission of pictures by wire"; and Professor Dayton C. Miller, of the

Case School of Applied Science, will give an evening lecture on "Contributions of optical measurements to physical theory." Professor Miller will discuss, among other things, his recent ether drift experiments at Mount Wilson.

The Optical Society of America was founded in 1916 to “serve the interests of those who are engaged in any branch of optics, from fundamental research to the manufacture of optical goods." Its present officers are:

President: Herbert E. Ives,

Bell Telephone Laboratory, Inc.,
New York City.

Vice-president: W. E. Forsythe,
Nela Research Laboratory,
Cleveland, Ohio.

Secretary: F. K. Richtmyer,
Cornell University,
Ithaca, N. Y.

Treasurer: Adolph Lomb,

Bausch and Lomb Optical Co.,

Rochester, N. Y.

The meetings are open to the public. A detailed program may be had by writing to the secretary.

SCIENTIFIC NOTES AND NEWS THE autumn session of the National Academy of Sciences will be held at the University of Wisconsin on November 9, 10 and 11. The local committee consists of C. K. Leith, Chairman; C. E. Allen, George C. Comstock, L. R. Jones, Max Mason, C. E. Mendenhall, Joel Stebbins and E. B. Van Vleck.

On the occasion of the meetings of the German Chemical Society at Nuremberg on September 2, Professor Gustav Dammann, of Göttingen, was presented with the Liebig commemorative medal of the society for his work on the properties of crystals, and Professor Otto Warburg, of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute of Berlin, was presented with the Adolf-Baeyer commemorative medal for his researches on the metabolism of tumors.

DR. ALOIS K. KOVARIK, professor of physics at Yale University, was presented with the medal of the University of Prague on the occasion of his recent visit to the university, where he gave a series of lectures.

F. L. STEVENS, professor of plant pathology at the University of Illinois, was recently granted a doctorate by the University of San Marcos at Lima, Peru, in recognition of his studies on tropical fungi.

THE Ecuadorean government has awarded the medal of merit to Dr. Michael E. Connor, a member of the International Health Board of the Rockefeller Foun

AT the University of Pennsylvania leaves of absence for the first half of the academic year have been granted to Dr. William Pepper, Jr., dean of the school of medicine; Dr. Charles B. Bazzoni, professor of experimental physics, and Dr. Francis C. Grant, associate in surgery.

ORVILLE WRIGHT has accepted the chairmanship of an advisory committee for the new school of aeronautics at New York University, which was recently established through a gift from Daniel Guggenheim.

THE American Röntgen Ray Society, meeting in Washington, D. C., has elected the following officers for the year 1926: Dr. Russell B. Carman, of Rochester, Minn., president; Dr. P. F. Butler, Boston, first vice-president; Dr. Charles F. Richards, San Jose, Calif., second vice-president; Dr. Charles L. Martin, Dallas, Tex., secretary; Dr. William A. Evans, Detroit, Mich., treasurer; Dr. Harry W. Bachelor, Toledo, Ohio, librarian.

THE British Röntgen Society has elected officers for the session 1925-26 as follows: President, Dr. F. W. Aston, F.R.S.; Vice-presidents, Dr. Robert Knox, Dr. N. S. Finzi and Professor A. W. Porter, F.R.S.; Honorable treasurer, Mr. Geoffrey Pearce; Honorable editor, Dr. G. W. C. Kaye; Honorable secretaries, Dr. E. A. Owen and Dr. R. J. Reynolds.

J. S. HIGHFIELD will be installed as president of the British Junior Institution of Engineers at the inaugural meeting of the forty-fifth session on December 11, when he will deliver his presidential address.

PROFESSOR E. F. BEAN, of the University of Wisconsin and for some years assistant state geologist, has been named acting director of the state geological survey and state geologist by the geological survey commission to succeed Professor W. O. Hotchkiss, who has been made president of the School of Mines at Houghton, Mich.

GEORGE MIKSCH SUTTON, of the Carnegie Museum, Pittsburgh, has been appointed Pennsylvania State Ornithologist, with headquarters in Harrisburg.

PROFESSOR HENRY H. NORRIS, formerly head of the department of electrical engineering at Cornell Uni