• Watson Davis, Director of Science Service, brought out some points in a recent luncheon talk that are well worth emphasizing. Creative and aggressive application of science is called for to meet the present emergency. Research, experimentation, and invention are as important to national defense as the airplanes, ships, tanks, and guns used by the military forces. In a large measure the weapons and the means of protection against weapons are created by science. New organizations have been created to do research for the military forces. There is the National Defense Research Committee which has over 200 secret projects underway. These involve the science facilities a t 80 of our large universities and personnel a t 30 large industrial laboratories. I t is estimated that a fourth of the physicists of the nation are in defense research and many of them are working on NDRC projects. The Army and Navy undertake much research directly but in these urgent times the normal military research of the nation has beeu increased many fold by the extensive organization of projects under the NDRC.
•The National Inventors Council, located in the Department of Commerce in Washington, has assumed the responsibility for receiving and evaluating any suggestions which may be offered by the public to help our national defense effort. They have already received many thousands of suggestions, some of which are already being put to use by the Army and Navy. There is always a chance that someone's "hunch" may prove vital, and the Council will see that every one is judged fairly. •The Bakelite Corporation (30 East 42nd Street, New York City) has some educational lecture exhibits which they are willing to loan to educational institutions for short periods of time. They tell briefly the raw material, manufacturing, and finished product stories of the different types of modern bakelite and vinylite plastics. They are in sturdy wooden cases, two feet square, which can be shipped safely and easily. Anyone interested in borrowing one of these exhibits can arrange to do so by writing the editor of the Bakelite Review (mentioning the JOURNAL OF CHEMICAL EDUCATION) and indicating the exact date the exhibit iswanted.
