be remembered that on May 5 the faculty of the institute adopted by a vote of 56 to 7 the report of the committee adverse to the affiliation. A full account of the report adopted by the faculty and of the minority report, together with an account of the meeting of the alumni on May 4 has been published in a special issue of The Technology Review.

GENERAL WILLIAM J. PALMER, of Colorado Springs, Col., and Mr. Andrew Carnegie have donated respectively $100,000 and $50,000 as a nucleus to the $500,000 endowment fund for Colorado College.

Ar the Commencement exercises of the Catholic University of America the rector, Mgr. O'Connell, stated that the university possesses, untouched by the Waggaman failure, assets and resources valued at $1,003,801. The bishops' collection ordered by the pope has resulted in $113,550 being turned into the treasury from 77 dioceses. A contingent fund of $200,000 has been raised since the Waggaman failure and has been invested in railroad bonds.

EARL B. LOVELL, adjunct professor of civil engineering at Columbia University has been appointed director of the College of Civil Engineering, at Cornell University, as successor to the late Professor E. A. Fuertes.

DR. RALPH HAMILTON CURTISS, lately Carnegie assistant at the Lick Observatory, has been appointed assistant professor of astronomy at the University of Western Pennsylvania.

In accordance with the tutorial system adopted by Princeton University, preceptors with the grade of assistant professor have been appointed in the department of philosophy and psychology as follows: Professor R. B. Johnson, of Miami University; Dr. Adam Leroy Jones, of Columbia University; Professor W. T. Marvin, of Western Reserve University; Dr. Wilmon H. Sheldon, of Columbia University, and Dr. E. G. Spaulding, of the College of the City of New York.

THE following appointments have been made in the scientific departments of the University of North Carolina: T. F. Hickerson,

instructor in mathematics; J. C. Hines, Jr., assistant in physics; E. B. Jeffress and B. H. Perry, assistants in geology; W. H. Kibler, B. F. Royal, T. P. Cheshire, assistants in biology; E. E. Randolph, C. W. Martin, L. M. Kelly, G. L. Paddisson, assistants in chemistry.

DR. JAMES BISSELL PRATT has been appointed instructor in philosophy and psychology, at Williams College.

Two fellowships of the value of $500 each, granted annually by the Woman's College of Baltimore, have this year been awarded to Miss Sabina Claire Ackerman, Easton, Pa., who will study chemistry at the University of Pennsylvania, and to Miss Sara White Cull, who will study biology at Columbia University. Other awards in science were as follows: The two scholarships at the Marine Biological Laboratory, at Woods Hole, Mass., to Miss Katie M. Brough, of Hanover, Pa., and to Miss Mary J. Hogue, of West Chester, Pa., both members of the graduating class. Three Woman's College scholarships, established at the Cold Spring Harbor Marine Laboratory of the Brooklyn Institute of Arts. and Sciences, to Miss Ethel Nicholson Browne, Miss Hettie Cole Caldwell and Miss Maude Cecil Gunther, of Baltimore, members of the junior class.

MR. CLARENCE MORGAN (Harvard) has been appointed to the new chair of railway transportation at McGill University, and H. H. Mackay (Dalhousie) has been appointed assistant professor of civil engineering.

MR. WILLIAM FINDLAY, tutor in mathematics at Columbia University, has been appointed professor of mathematics at McMaster University, Canada.

MR. A. R. LORD, B.A. Oxon., assistant to the professor of moral philosophy and lecturer on political science in Aberdeen University, has been appointed professor of philosophy and history in the Rhodes University College, Grahamstown, Cape Colony.

MR. EDWARD P. CULVERWELL, M.A., fellow of Trinity College, Dublin, has been appointed to the new chair of education in the university.

physics and chemistry alone. Nor is it possible to offer such explanations without the assistance of these sciences. The progress of the work in physiology is indissolubly bound up in the development of other sciences. The benefits are, however, mutual, and as physiology acknowledges the fundamental importance of these related sciences, they in turn must acknowledge the important contributions, often of fundamental nature, which have resulted through physiological investigation.

In such a paper it would be impossible to do more than outline briefly some of the relationships of special problems which, for one reason or another, merit emphasis. In general, the problems in plant physiology have been well brought out and systematized through the monumental work recently completed by Professor Pfeffer. To him the science owes a debt of gratitude which may be acknowledged as well by one who attempts to suggest future work as by the historian. Again, due recognition should be made of those who have in recent years based upon this or any similar topic valedictory addresses before various botanical organizations-notably, those of Professors Vines, Ward, Barnes, Reynolds Green and others.

The fact that every cell or organ requires its food materials, or at least its nutrients, in liquid form, readily emphasizes the fundamental importance of those problems suggested by the relation of the plant to solutions. The mechanisms for absorption and the general and special diosmotic properties of the living cell, all of which have been studied with the most consummate skill, have yielded matchless results; yet the rewards for future research show at present no distinct limitations. It has not been possible to determine the nature of the plasmatic membrane which directly or indirectly possesses such marked

powers of selection and accumulation. The conditions under which the activities of this membrane may be modified are but poorly understood; and it is, perhaps, quite beyond the present possibilities to determine the mechanism of this modification, for in that must be involved one of the most important vital activities of protoplasm. Perhaps, when much more data. have been accumulated by a study of plants of diverse habitat, the conditions of this modification may be more clearly distinguished. It is known that continued endosmosis of a particular solute depends largely upon the use or transformation of this solute within, yet it is not always possible to demonstrate any change in the substance absorbed. In any event, it is necessary to ask further light upon the exosmotic resistance of the plasmatic membrane to the accumulation of turgor-producing substances, or, in other words, to a further explanation of what may be termed one way penetration. To these phenomena the processes of excretion and secretion are closely allied, whether they are ultimately, periodically, or continuously the function of certain protoplasts.

Further chemical knowledge is needed dealing with the meaning of high pressures and of the accommodation of very high pressures in the fungi. As a rule, those protoplasts seem to be resistant to such high pressures which are also resistant to cold, desiccation and other stimulation. Mayerburg, working under the instruction of Professor Pfeffer, has recently applied himself to a study of the method by means of which the organism may regulate its turgor. It is evident that one of two propositions must be assumed, and that increased turgor may be produced either (1) by the penetration of substances from without, or (2) by substances of strong osmotic action produced within the cell

through the stimulative action of external agents. It was determined in this case that in general no absorption of the substances bathing the plant occurs; therefore, osmotic substances are produced within the cell and largely by increased concentration of the normal organic cell products. The extent and method of this capability for turgor regulation are highly important, as is also the general question of the relation of turgor to growth. In recent times some of the important problems in this connection have been well suggested by the work of Ryssleberghe, Puriewitsch, Overton, Copeland and Livingston.

The absorptive systems of plants seem to be admirably adapted for their needs. from a diosmotic point of view. Diffusion may, therefore, be sufficiently rapid to supply all demands of the absorbing cells or organs. Nevertheless, the assumption that ordinarily diffusion through the cell and plasmatic membrane is sufficiently rapid properly to provide for the translocation of metabolic products from cell to cell is certainly open to further inquiry. Present knowledge of the translocatory processes is insufficient. Plasmatic connections between cells are now known to be of common occurrence, and this fact has given further interest to the above inquiry. Brown and Escombe are of the opinion that the plasmatic connections are eminently adapted for all of those phenomena which they have found to belong, as subsequently mentioned, to multiperforate septa. They claim, further, that with slight differences of osmotic pressure the necessary concentration of gradient for increased translocation would be very simply effected.

Thus far it has been difficult to throw any light upon cell-absorption and selection in many complex natural relationships by calling in the assistance of the dissociation theory and the ionic relationships of the

salts in the soil. The external relationships of nutrient salts, or the relative abundance of these in substrata supporting vegetation, constitutes a problem with which the physiologist must be concerned. It is only necessary to glance at the results of work done by various experiment stations in this country to be convinced of the great physiological importance which may be attached to such studies.

Recent results tend to emphasize the importance of considering to a greater degree the physical conditions of the soil. Some have even gone so far as to claim that practically all soils contain a sufficient quantity of plant food; and that the allimportant question is the regulation of the water supply in accordance with the quality of the particular soil. This latter, however, is an error into which few physiologists have fallen. Nevertheless, precise studies upon the relation of plants to the physical characters of soils afford problems which should receive the best attention. Many of the problems are not new, and in a qualitative way, at least, the problem of the relationship of the conservation of moisture and the tilth of the soil to productiveness has been duly appreciated by the best agronomists. We must notice with regret, therefore, that botanists have not always appreciated the importance of such work. Either directly or indirectly the water factor is a chief one in regulating the activities of the living plant and must be considered from every possible point of view.

It may, perhaps, be less a problem than a routine matter to determine the relation of the rate of absorption of salts in the soil solutions to water under the varying conditions of growth and transpiration. Nevertheless, information of this nature is important.

In spite of all the recent work, the phys

ical explanation of the ascent of water in trees is a problem which must be mentioned. The renewed investigations which have been made along this line from an objective point of view will undoubtedly contribute to its eventual solution.

It is a matter of interest that in their studies of the physics of transpiration, Brown and Escombe have found evidence to regard this process also as a matter of diffusion through multiperforate septa, rather than a matter of mass action. It is calculated that by diffusion water may pass out of the stomates to an extent as much as six times the actual amount of transpiration which has been observed in special

cases.

The great number of cytological investigations which have been completed within. the past ten years indicate notable advancements in a most important field; and this is particularly true with relation to the study of nuclear phenomena. Through this work light has been thrown upon many problems of cell physiology and of development and as a result of the latter new theories of heredity have been advanced. Nevertheless, the field for investigation has been constantly broadened and many new lines of research made possible. In spite of the excellent results accomplished, there is yet great uncertainty as to the interpretations which have frequently been made. In no field of work, perhaps, is it possible for the personal factor to enter into the results more largely than in this. Again, it is unfortunately true that fixed material has been studied almost to the exclusion of all other and that even general observations relating to the conditions of growth have been omitted in many instances. Much attention has been bestowed upon the minutest details which seem to be of morphological significance in the nucleus; but often the purely physiological side has been

insufficiently emphasized. It is quite possible that in different plants, the exact method of chromosome division, or the manner of nucleolar disappearance, may not be similar; and it is certainly well known that external conditions may considerably modify the details of spindle formation, and perhaps other details in nuclear and cell division. The important point in every case is to determine if the same physiological purpose may be accomplished.

It is extremely important, however, to the subject of physiology that the methods. which have made possible these cytological advances shall be extended and utilized in developing a knowledge of all of the various activities of the cell. In this way, a clearer insight may be given of many abstruse metabolic processes; and certainly further light may be thrown upon the matter of protoplasmic decompositions and secretions, the production of enzymes and alkaloids, tannins and other products. Going hand in hand with observations upon fresh material, the limitations of microchemistry alone should determine the possibilities in this direction of the work.

In such cytological investigations, Fischer's work on the artificial production of effects resembling those seen in fixed protoplasm should be borne well in mind. This work is timely, and may assist in checking irrational developments by forcing a proper regard for a comparison of the effects observed in fixed tissues with those shown by the living material.

There are, moreover, but few directions in which the study of metabolism and metabolic products may not profit from cytological research. A notable instance of what there is to be done is well indicated by the work of the late Dr. Timberlake on the division of plastids and the development of the starch grain.