SCIENCE SIFTINGS.

Auckland Star, Volume XLIII, Issue 305, 21 December 1912, Page 15

SCIENCE SIFTINGS.

VACCINATION BKFORE MARRIAGE. Vaccination is compulsory in Norway and Sweden before a. couple can be legally married. A minister will not perform the ceremony unless lie be shown certificates that both bride and bridegToom have been vaccinated. Parents and guardians, before consenting to the I marriage of their charges, require a mediea i certificate from the bride or bridegroom certifying that he or she has been vaccinated. A NEW METHOD OF HEATING. A machine that 'will toast a hundred million slices of bread in eight hours has born invented by Professor Bone, of Leeds Vniversity, who startled the world of science about a year ago by •.imiouncing tr.fi discovery of nameless incandescent surface combustion, and Mr. I. D. McCourt, a practical engineer. The professor ie now exploiting his diecovrry commercially, and his toast making machine will shortly be placed on the market. }te principle is simple. Slices of bread are attached to an endiees band jof eteel which rune betw-een two plates I raised to an intense heat by Professor I Bone's system. THE BIGGEST BRAINS. In point of brain weight, the following in the order named are the twelve leading names, the weights being indicated in grammes:—lvan Tourgenref, Russian noveliet, 2,102; Joseph Bouny, French jurist. 1.935: George Cuvier, Franco-Ger-man naturalist, 1,830; E. H. Knight, American mathematician, 1.514; Franz X. Kraus, German theologian, 1.S00; John Abercrombie, Scottish physician. 1,786; Benjamin F. Butler. American statesman, 1.755; Edward Olney, American niaTt'Cmatician, 1,701; Herman Levi, German composer, 1.690; A. Winchell, American geologist, 1.660; William M. Thackeray, English novelist, 1,658; Rudolf Lenz, German cdmposer, 1,636. TEA-DRTNKIKG AND DEAFNESS. Dr. A. Sharp reports the case of a woman, aged forty, who complained of increasing deafness for about eighteen m-onthe. On examination there was found difficulty in locating sound, but no tinnitus (subjective noises in the ear) ; 1 watch and whispered voice were heard about six inches from both ears; nose and throat were healthy; ear drums were normal. Tuning fork tests were typical of nerve deafness. Family history was negative. Subject to worry, the patient found that strong tea cheered her up, and -admitted taking it as often as eight or ten times a day. The tea-drinking was stopped, and in four weeks the hearing improved to 18 inches for watch and whispered voice. Improvement continued until the hearing was nearly normal. In spite of -warning the patient again took to tea drinking and deafness resnlted, but on again giving up the habit normal hearing returned. SUPPOSING THE AIR WENT! It is rather interesting to contemplate the successive events on the earth if the atmosphere should be quickly removed. The first thing that would probably happen is that every animal, insect, fish, bird, and plant w«uld suffer a violent explosion; for each contains air at a pressure of fifteen pounds to the square inch on the outside, which is balanced by an equal pressure on the inside, which would rudh outward on the first pressure being removed. This can be shown by placing the -hand over an air-pump and! gradually exhausting the air; the part! exposed will gradually swell. Anotheri illustration is when a tornado sweeps' i round a house, taking the outside airj away for an instant. If the 'house Lsj closed, the windows, and doors will be! blown outward with enormous force, and! sometimes the sides themselves of the! house are blown in all directions. INFANTILE PARALYSIS SPREAD BY STABLE FLY. Infantile paralysis is transmitted by the stable fly is the important discovery which Dt. M. J. Rosenau, professor of, preventive medicine and hygiene at Har-] yard, announced to the fifteenth Inter-; national Congress of Hygiene and Demography. Dr. Rosenau experimented with monkeys, the animals most closely re- ; seirfbling man. Twelve monkeys were infected with infantile paralysis. At different stages of the illness a large number of stable flies were introduced into, the closely screened cages containing the; monkeys. The stable fly bites. After a certain period the stable flies were transferred to cages containing well monkeys. Theae annuals after being bitten by the flies developed all the symptoms of infantile paralysis, just as they appear in children afflicted -with the disease. Some of the monkeys died. Dr. Rosenau took tissues from the monkeys thus infected by the fliea and injected them into a third set of monkeys, which thereupon developed the disease. A method for eradication and control of infantile paralysis is now placed in the hands of sanitarians. It is believed that the necessity of quarantine is thus relieved, and that it will suffice to place a bed net around the patient. HUMAN VEHICLES OF DISEASE. lAt a recent Health Congress in Washington interesting papers on infectious diseases and their spread were read by Dre. J. C. Ledingham, of the Lister Institute, London, and William Lorenze Moss, of the John Hopkins' University. The case of "Typhoid Mary," it will be remembered, attracted much professional attention in the United States; but it waa not uniojue. According to Dr. Charles Boldman, of the -New York City Department of Health, typhoid bacillus carriers have a very large share in producing typhoid infections in New York City. In particular, great importance attaches to the chronic 'typhoid bacillus carrier employed in dairying. One such carrier etxtdied by mc caused over 300 casee of typhoid fever ko New York. It is now agreed that no known typhoid carriers shonld be alkrwed to engage in dairying. The great difficulty ai the pr<«ent 'time is the recognition of these carriers, and this, like many other public health problems, ifi largely a question, of expense. Dr. Fornet, of Berlin, argned that the campaign against typlhodd begun in Germany eight years ago has shown that the disease sticks to the place where it has once occurred. "The fact that I cotrld trace thirty-one families where two or even more members were typhoid hosts makes it likely that a second infection with typhoid bacilli often makes people become bacilli carriers, a theory I could verify by experiments on beasts. CleanUness alone can do much in preventing this undesirable state of the body." Dr. A. C. Abbott, of Philadelphia, said that in his city the authorities, having , examined every child in a certain school situated in a district of 15.000 inhabitants, found thirty ■bacilTas carriers among the pupils, sent them hemp, and in this -way put an end to an epidemic of diptberia which had already . made some head-way