National Academy

At Urbana, Ill., where Harold ("Red") Grange learned to earn a living at football,* the National Academy of Sciences met last week. Mentioned during the proceedings were:

Presbyotia. People speak just about as fast as they hear--some 20 changes a second, said Dr. J. McKeen Cattell, editor of Science. To be heard by an audience or by people hard of hearing, one must speak distinctly and slowly, not loudly. A stump speaker's shouting is only a blur of tones to his listeners. In old people, the receiving apparatus of the ear becomes less elastic than in youth; it does not respond quickly to short waves (shrill) sounds. Words or notes of music following in fast succession run together and cannot be distinguished. The condition is presbyotia (old age hearing). Presbyotes cannot hear cricket chirps, nor high pitched yodeling.

Muscular Anesthesia. In rowdy secret society initiations the novice, standing rigidly erect, arms at sides, is made to inhale very deeply and hold his breath. As his face grows red and his eyes bulge, great arms glide around his chest, like brewers' clamps over a beer keg. Just as the initiant feels like the inflated frog of Aesop's fairy tale, the great arms squeeze; the victim drops heavily, rendered unconscious by muscular anesthesia. This initiation "stunt," Professor Arno Benedict Luckhardt of the University of Chicago reminded the Academy, is dangerous to a person with a weak heart. The sudden compression of the chest when the lungs are fully inflated checks the flow of blood, produces a sudden fall in blood pressure, followed by a rapid reaction high above the normal.

Assembled Animalcula. Dr. Charles Manning Child of the University of Chicago spent last summer at the Scripps Biological Institute/- at Miramar, Calif. There he collected some tiny animals of the sponge family (corymorpha, helmet-shaped bodies) ; ground them in a mortar until they were shapeless pulp; bolted the mess through fine silk. In the strained liquid were living corymorpha cells, single or in groups of small number. After the liquid stood a while, the cells collected into small spheres. Many of the spheres--assembled from originally different animals--developed into complete & healthy corymorphae.

Animal Variations. Dr. Frank Collins Baker, curator of the museum of natural history of the University of Illinois, found in a Wisconsin artificial lake several species of shellfish peculiar to fresh running water. At the end of the lake where streams entered, the mollusks had remained true to type. At the other, their shells had thickened; grown stubbier. This situation apparently proved that environment produces new varieties in low-grade forms of life.

Split Quantum. One theory of matter is the quantum theory-- that all things, all radiations are built up of quanta, or trifling pulsations of energy. Light is thus considered the effect of many quanta popping after one another. Dr. A. J. Dempter of the University of Chicago told how he had directed the light from a single vibrating atom at a thinly silvered mirror. In theory a single file of quanta battered at the mirror. Part of these reflected away, part passed through, just as would ordinary light. Possibly, thought Dr. Dempter, the quantum, smallest theoretical unit, was split into less comprehensible smithereens.

*Mr. Grange, head of the New York Yankees, professional footballers, walked with a cane last week. His right leg had been wrenched in a sports melee.

/-Endowed by Miss Ellen Browning Scripps, sister of the late newspaper publisher Edward Wyllis Scripps (TIME, Feb. 22, 1926).