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JOURNAL OF CHEMICAL EDUCATION
MAY.1930
PRARMACOPEIA ANALYSES FOR MEDICAL STUDENTS Sarver' has presented an interesting discussion of some problems in connection with quantitative analysis for pre-medical students. We have been solving some of these problems for about ten years by using the United States Pharmacopeia. The Pharmacopeia is a treatise that is only too little known by chemists. The methods of the Pharmacopeia have been selected with great care, practically all of them have the merit of being simple, accurate, well tested, and of being "official." The pre-medical student becomes ac7,3fi5-6 (Feb., 1930) THISJOURNAL,
VOL. 7, NO. 5
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quainted with the "se of the book, and with the analysis of substances which are largely used in medicine. Most of the methods are volumetric. Our pre-medical students make Pharmacopeia analyses of acetic acid, ammonia water, hydrogen peroxide, ferric chloride solution, and Fowler's potassium arsenite solution. It will be noted that these exercises involve titration with standardized base, acid, potassium permanganate, sodium thiosulfate, and iodine, respectively. DICKINSON COLLEGE E. A. VUILLZUMIER CARLI~LE, PENNA.
Increase in Cures of Bone Cancer Due to X-Rays.
Great increase in the number of Colt Bloodgood of Baltimore t o X-rays and to popular education in their value. Dr. Bloodgood recently addressed the Radiological Society of North America. He and Dr. Russell I,. Haden of Kansas City received the society's gold medal for their work with X-rays. "Before the discovery of the X-rays there was rarely if ever a verified cancer of bone cured by amputation," Dr. Bloodgood said. "Since the discovery of the X-rays and up t o 1921 the actual cures of cancer of bone, in the records of The Johns Hopkins Hospital Surgical Pathological Laboratory, were four per cent. Today, now that more people know the importance of an immediate examination after the slightest warning or injury t o a bone, the curves have increased to thirty-five per cent." Over one-third of the persons treated a t the hospital for bone cancer since 1921 have lived for a t least five years without any recurrence of the disease. Apparently they have been "cured." The warnings of cancer of the bone are not different from the warnings of troubles of the bone that are not cancer, Dr. Bloodgood said. %in or discomfort of some kind, swelling or slight 105s of functiun should he inveztigatcd immediately and X-ray examination slmuld be part of the investigation. This is particulirls mportant after accidents or injuries, even if no break in the bone is apparent. Slight breaks and injuries of bones can be disclosed by the X-ray which, if undiscovered and untreated, might lead t o serious trouble later on, Dr. Bloodgood warned.-Science S e m a Rare Sugar Now Made Cheaply from Cotton-Seed Hull Bran. Xylose, a sugar so rare that it has heretofore been a laboratory curiosity a t $100 a pound, can now be turned out cheaply a t a few cents a pound, requiring no raw material other than waste cottonseed hull bran, water, and sulfuric acid. At the recent meeting of the chemistry section of the American Association for the Advancement of Science a t Ames, Iowa, Warren E. Emley of the U. S. Bureau of Standards described the prtxess by which seed waste is changed into sugar. Xylose is different from its nearest neighbors in the sugar world, the hexoses or glucose-type of sugars, in that it contains five carbon atoms to the molecule instead of six. Because it bas always been so rare and expensive, it has never been possible t o perform any extensive experiments with it, and consequently it has no known uses. But the experimental plant a t Anniston, Ala., can turn out a hundred pounds a day, and when larger units are built they will have an annual production of about a million tons of cotton-seed hull bran t o work on. So that if xylose has any uses i t shouldnot take Long now t o discover them. Mr. Emley suggested that i t might be used directly in food products, or possibly industrially as a raw material for alcohol, acids, and other chemicals.-Science Senn'ce cases "cured" of bone cancer in recent years was attributed by Dr:Joseph
