War Gas Used to Kill Silk Cocoons. A war gas made by Prof. Gabriel Bertrand of the Pasteur Institute has found a peace-time use in the silk industry. The silk cocoons are gassed by small quantities of chloropicrin which has proved exceedingly practical and easy t o handle. The gas has been tried out in various silk-raising centers and has been found to possess marked advantages over killing the cocoons by baking or steaming. Under the prevalent methods of silk culture the cocoons have t o be all sold within a oeriod of two or three weeks, but the use of chloropicrin promises a practical way, i t is said, for the growers to turn the cocoons into non-perishable merchandise which can he sold when the market is best.-Science Senn'ce Vitamin Feeding Makes Better Chickens. Hens given vitamin A in addition to their r e y l a r diet not only hatch more chicks but are healthier themselves and lay bigger and better eggs. Dr. Arthur D. Holmes of Boston told of the effect of feeding vitamin-rich cod-liver oil t o domcstic fowl, a t a meeting of the American Chemical Society in Philadelphia. Rhode Island Red pullets wcre given doses of cod-liver oil each day and as a result Dr. Holmes found that they laid more eggs. The eggs themselves were larger than usual and their fertility was =eater. Fewer ems . . contained obieftionable blood soots. The greater number and size of the eggs did not make nervous wrecks of the laying hens. On the contrary they showed increased vitality and did not lose weight during the tests. They had a greater resistance to diseases, for fewer of the vitamin-fed ones died than the ones who lived on the normal hen diet alone.-Science Senn'ce Electrons Not Smallest Things. New evidence that there is another world of almost infrnite minuteness, beyond the electron which only recently replaced the atom as the smallest thing in the universe, was brought forward a t Diisseldorf by Prof. Felix Ehrejlaft of Vienna University, speaking before the meeting of the Association of German Natural Scientists and Physicians. Prof. Ehrenhaft's data were obtained by means of a new and highly powerful apparatus for ultra-microscopic examination devised by himself, which makes oossible the observation of oartides far below the limits of ordinary microscopic visibility, floating freely in a gaseous atmosphere in a magnetic field. bits He observed in this magnetized sub-microscooic field the behavior of dobular of gaseous selenium a ith diameters of only one two hundrcd-filty thousmdLh of an inch. Thcir rate of drift, under the inflmnce of the maynet, indicated that thc electrical char~es they carried wcre less than theequivalent of oneelectron. This would indicate, according to I'rof. Ilhrenhaft, that the electronis suhdivisihle and, thcr~forr,thnt ~urnethinasmollrr than the electron exists.-Science Senrice Germans Make Wool from Pine Needles. Chemically treated pine needles have worked out in Berlin as a substitute for wool for certain purposes very successfully. By varying the process a woolly product is obtained that comes either in the shape of fine sheet wadding or in soft fleeces that are used to stuff mattresses. The pine wool has fine, strong fibers not unlike hemp, and finds its best use when woven into heavy materials such as carpets and horse blankets. The new process has a valuable asset in one of its by-products that results from the chemical treatment necessary to remove the resin from the needles. The stickv residue is shaped into resinous briquettes which have a very high fuel value and which have found a ready use in the manufacture of artificial illuminating gas.-Science Senice Russians Discover Potash Deposits. Potash deposits in the district of Solikamsk, government of Perm, are declared by Soviet chemists to be Russia's delivery from the Franco-German fertilizer monopoly controlled through the Stassfurt beds, hitherto the world's principal source of this important mineral. The Russian deposits, i t is stated, are found over an area almost a thousand square miles in extent, and beds capable of being mined exist as dose to the surface as 300 feet.-Science Service
