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LONDON SCHOOL OF HYGIENE AND TROPICAL MEDICINE.
175 accommodation for these cases, and arranging for committee found the arrangements for teaching for teaching to medical students and practitioners the the Diploma of Public Health in London scattered and inadequate. The great post-graduate teaching special -measures needed. centre which the Athlone Committee visualised as a THE POPULAR LECTURE. at once became possible by the fact that the " necessity Many Men, One Aim." trustees of the Rockefeller Foundation offered the Prof. W. W. JAMESON said that with some justice munificent gift of$2,000,000 for carrying out the we spoke of ourselves as pioneers in public health, but which the Athlone Committee recommended. project of our record that, with past achievements, we were In this way it became possible that hygiene and inclined to be just a little complacent, and to give public health should have a university institution of insufficient heed to the doings of other nations. By its own. And when further in the course of our studying other peoples’ methods we should be able deliberations the Seamen’s Hospital Society expressed either to improve our own, or to feel assured that we their willingness that the old School of Tropical Dr. Jameson Medicine should become were working on the best lines possible. merged in the institution, we went on to give a most interesting account of the work felt indeed that these great twin subjects of hygiene of the public health services in Germany, in Poland, and tropical medicine had at last their long-sought and in the U.S.A., and concluded with a quotation opportunity, and that a new epoch in the history of from a speech of Dr. Vincent, the president of the medicine and related sciences, and in hygiene, was Rockefeller Foundation, describing an ideal inter- about to be opened. Mr. Chamberlain at the foundanationalism that can hardly be bettered, in which tion-stone laying, reminded us of the distinguished " a generous national rivalry plays an even larger part which his father, Mr. Joseph Chamberlain, had part without weakening true patriotic feeling. To played in founding, at the instance of Sir Patrick contribute to a common world fund of knowledge, Manson, the School for the study of diseases of the skill, and idealism becomes the ambition of each tropics, and it is a pleasure again to recall this fact. nation. Patriotism gains a nobler significance." We shall continue to be indebted to the Seamen’s Hospital Society for clinical and pathological facilities for the study of these diseases, now that we LONDON SCHOOL OF HYGIENE AND have entered into our new home." The speaker went TROPICAL MEDICINE. on to point out that to-day the presence at their THE OPENING OF THE NEW BUILDING. gathering of Mr. Chamberlain, the ex-Minister, and Mr. A. Greenwood, the present Minister of Health, THE new building of the London School of Hygiene was evidence that the School which, in union with the and Tropical Medicine was formally opened on University of London, would be partly maintained by grants, and be open to all nations, Thursday, July 18th, by H.R.H. the Prince of Wales. Parliamentary The building was fully described in THE LANCET last would be in a position where party politics played no week (July 20th, p. 149), with illustrations showing share, a position that was necessary for the establishIt was, he concluded, the the important facades on Gower-street and Keppel- ment of the laws of health. future duty of the British public and British Governstreet, and the splendid library, and at the same time ment to see that the School was adequately maintained. the origin of the school, the part played by British in and the immense debt its organisation, workers The Prince’s Speech. incurred to the Rockefeller Foundation were recorded. The Prince to the address of welcome by replied The proceedings commenced with the reception of the Prince of Wales at the main, or Keppel-street formally declaring the building open in the following :entrance, by Lord Melchett, Chairman of the Board words " You have right to be proud of the magnificent of Management, Sir Holburt Waring, Chairman of the Court of Governors, and Sir Gregory Foster, Vice- building in which we are, and if the museums and Chancellor of the University of London. The Director theatre and laboratories make good the promise of of the School, Dr. Andrew Balfour, was presented to his this library, you are to be congratulated upon a that will be a notable addition to the homes Royal Highness, as were the architects of the building, building of in London. While the part played by learning Mr. Morley Horder and Mr. Verner 0. Rees, who offered America has been described to you, the duty the Prince of Wales the key of the building. lies on both the British Government and the British The Address of Welcome. people to see that this School is worthily endowed In the beautiful library a large and representative and maintained. The building is a sign that postgroup of visitors were assembled to hear an address graduate education in medicine is about to come into of welcome to the Prince, offered by Lord Melchett. its own. The establishment and endowment of this The speaker pointed out that those responsible for centre of teaching in preventive medicine is a signal the management of the School had embarked upon example of the bond between the two great Englishan enterprise made possible only by the benefaction speaking races of the world. The chairman has rightly of the trustees of the Rockefeller Foundation, which said that there are no territorial frontiers in hygiene. had realised that the claims of London as a centre for The instruction in the class rooms and laboratories the teaching of hygiene and tropical medicine were of this building will be conveyed by medical practiunparalleled, and that assistance to provide the tioners of every nationality to the far corners of the of a central institute was therefore urgent. earth. This research will find its results wherever Lord Melchett reminded the audience that when man lives and moves and has his being. three years ago the foundation-stone of the building " Three periods in medical science are stamped in which they stood was laid by Mr. Neville definitely, each with its own characteristics. The Chamberlain, then Minister of Health, the American first, from 1870 to 1900, was a period of sanitary flag was flying side by side with the Union Jack reform. The next period was marked by growing above their heads, and the same was occurring to-day concern for the protection of the individual, which had as a fitting reminder of their debt to American been the basis of recent legislation, as evidenced by generosity. The absence from the ceremony of any maternity and child welfare, the treatment of tuberWe stand representative of the Rockefeller Foundation was, he culosis and National Health Insurance. said, characteristic of the self-effacing policy of that now in the early days of an era of preventive medicine establishment, while the Ambassador of the United in which the progress made in sanitation and care of States unfortunately had another engagement which the individual will be developed, and fresh research could not be cancelled. Lord Melchett continued :- will lead to the solution of problems not yet solved and " The gift of the Foundation followed immediately to the prevention of much ill-health. The establishupon, even if it was not the direct consequence of, the ment of this school is of special importance to the recommendations of a committee which met in 1921 British Empire, and it has undertaken great responsiunder the presidency of a distinguished relative of bilities. In my travels I have learned personally the your Royal Highness, the Earl of Athlone. The appallingloss of life and effort due to tropical diseases,
building
176 and I realised the great need for research in tropical medicine and hygiene. In the cause of hygiene generally the school will help and develop the growing work that has already been done. For these reasons I believe that the establishment of this school provides ENZYME ACTIONS AND PROPERTIES. a great opportunity for this country and for the whole world. By ERNST WALDSC111%11DT-LEITZ, Institut fur " Biochemie, Deutsche Technische Hochschule, If its work is properly conceived and carried out, Prag. Translated and extended by ROBERT P. and interest, should a follow there special development WALTON, Department of Organic Chemistry, and a quickening of the public conscience, which will Columbia University. London: Chapman and lead to a steady decrease in preventible diseases, York: John Wiley and Sons, Ltd. New Hall, suffering and death. By its work in this connection Inc. 1929. Pp. 255. 20s. the school will be judged." THERE are many books upon enzymes. Some of The Addresses of Thanks. them are almost entirely theoretical and physicoA fanfare of trumpets sounded by the Coldstream chemical ; others are laboratory handbooks giving Guards followed, when an address of thanks was methods for the preparation of active ferments from presented by Sir Holburt Waring. Sir Holburt their natural sources ; others are largely catalogues pointed out that throughout the erection of the build- of facts. This volume falls into none of these classes, ing, and in every stage of its rise, the notion of a work- but sets out to describe enzymes and their actions shop had been kept clearly in view all the time. He from a definite point of view-that of the Willstatter said that the London School of Hygiene and Tropical school. Prof. E. Waldschmidt-Leitz has played a Medicine was intended to be a centre of Imperial effort, considerable part in the brilliant series of researches and alluded to the pertinent fact that already the on enzymes carried out during the last ten years Court of Governors, as part of a policy of future by Prof. Willstatter and his associates at Munich, development, had taken over from the Government and his book has the value to be found only in the of Southern Rhodesia the research station there. It work of one who has himself had practical experience would, he knew, be the policy of the School to estab- of the problems involved. In order to appraise the lish a chain of such research stations throughout the book it is necessary to consider in what respects the Empire as adequate funds were forthcoming, and to work of Willstatter differs from that of his -Dredesend out expeditions from time to time to the tropics. cessors. In the first place, he has set out to place As Chairman of the building committee he recalled the preparation of enzymes on a quantitative basis, that at the conception it had been decided that the such as is customary in experiments in synthetic first condition laid down for competing architects organic chemistry, for example, and he has considered should be " Let there be Light," and in the employ- in all cases the number of units of enzyme activity ment of half a million sterling real concern he believed recovered after purification as well as the unitand hoped had been shown to make the expenditure weight of the enzyme preparation. This outlook wide and judicious. The Director of the School, the led to a greatly increased efficiency in the various professors, and the departmental heads had throughout steps used in purification. Many of the methods been consulted in the construction of their laboratories employed by Willstatter are based on selective and workshops, and it had not been found necessary, adsorption of the enzyme on to various substances thanks to the generous measure of the Rockefeller such as alumina and kaolin, and subsequent removal gift, to refuse a single request for any piece of essential (elution), usually by alteration of the reaction of the equipment. He associated the Director, professors, and medium. Such processes are not new, but in the staff with the governors and the board of management hands of Willstatter and his colleagues they have in thanking His Royal Highness for the encouragement led to some remarkable results, such as the separaand inspiration of his presence. tion of enzymes from their closely associated conSir Gregory Foster, also, in thanking the Prince, taminants, from activators, and from other enzymes. said that the new School would rank as a part of the Willstatter considers that the enzymes are composed University of the metropolis-the University of the of a colloidal bearer and a specific, active group, capital city of the Empire-and that its work would which enables them to be bound to the substrate, be organised, not for London, and not even for the and the composition of the active group at the same Empire, but for the world. In alluding to the many time conditions the colloidal nature of the entire great men who had been educated at the University complex. One of the most striking facts which have of London, and who had gone forth to make the emerged from Willstatter’s researches is that the world a better and happier place, he said he would properties of the enzyme are often profoundly modimention one name only, that of Lord Lister, who was fied by their intensive purification. Thus the conventional view regarding the higher protein fission a graduate of the University of London, and received his education in London. The Vice-Chancellor products as the specific substrate of trypsin, which described in humorous terms the curiosity that had only hydrolyses these substances in the presence of been aroused in the neighbourhood by the new build- the activator enterokinase, has received a rude blow ing, the reason for whose existence the local public from some recent work of this school. Trypsin had not yet grasped, while he was certain that the prepared by adsorptive methods did not attack new School would increase the tradition of magnificent ordinary peptides when activated by enterokinase ; service in the cause of humanity which the University on the other hand, certain basic proteins, such as of London possessed, by sending back students, who the protamines and also the products of peptic had arrived from all parts of the world to be taught, digestion, are rapidly broken down even by the nonIn other respects the convenactivated enzyme. as missionaries of health. tional views receive short shrift from Prof. WaldHis Royal Highness then visited the museum, theschmidt-Leitz. Most text-books, even quite modern laboratories, and the lecture theatre, and before leavingones, state unequivocally that the gastric proteolytic the building met the workmen employed in its con- enzyme is secreted as an inactive zymogen known as struction who were having their mid-day meal in a pepsinogen or pro-pepsin, which is converted to the tent adjoining the premises. Here the health of the: active form by the action of the hydrochloric acid Royal visitor was drunk in beer with musical honours. in the stomach. This view is based on the observed A large number of those who were invited to be: effect of acid (which may more logically be regarded present at the opening ceremony remained to luncheon as a pH effect), and the varying stability to alkali as the guests of Lord Melchett, and afterwards, under of the active and inactive forms. This variation of the supervision of the Director, professors and stability may, however, be due to different amount members of the staff were shown around the building, of associated substances in the enzyme solutions and were present at cinematograph displays in the! under comparison. In any case the evidence in lecture theatre. favour of a zymogen precursor is very small.
Reviews and Notices of Books.
,
,
.
.
.
,
building
176 and I realised the great need for research in tropical medicine and hygiene. In the cause of hygiene generally the school will help and develop the growing work that has already been done. For these reasons I believe that the establishment of this school provides ENZYME ACTIONS AND PROPERTIES. a great opportunity for this country and for the whole world. By ERNST WALDSC111%11DT-LEITZ, Institut fur " Biochemie, Deutsche Technische Hochschule, If its work is properly conceived and carried out, Prag. Translated and extended by ROBERT P. and interest, should a follow there special development WALTON, Department of Organic Chemistry, and a quickening of the public conscience, which will Columbia University. London: Chapman and lead to a steady decrease in preventible diseases, York: John Wiley and Sons, Ltd. New Hall, suffering and death. By its work in this connection Inc. 1929. Pp. 255. 20s. the school will be judged." THERE are many books upon enzymes. Some of The Addresses of Thanks. them are almost entirely theoretical and physicoA fanfare of trumpets sounded by the Coldstream chemical ; others are laboratory handbooks giving Guards followed, when an address of thanks was methods for the preparation of active ferments from presented by Sir Holburt Waring. Sir Holburt their natural sources ; others are largely catalogues pointed out that throughout the erection of the build- of facts. This volume falls into none of these classes, ing, and in every stage of its rise, the notion of a work- but sets out to describe enzymes and their actions shop had been kept clearly in view all the time. He from a definite point of view-that of the Willstatter said that the London School of Hygiene and Tropical school. Prof. E. Waldschmidt-Leitz has played a Medicine was intended to be a centre of Imperial effort, considerable part in the brilliant series of researches and alluded to the pertinent fact that already the on enzymes carried out during the last ten years Court of Governors, as part of a policy of future by Prof. Willstatter and his associates at Munich, development, had taken over from the Government and his book has the value to be found only in the of Southern Rhodesia the research station there. It work of one who has himself had practical experience would, he knew, be the policy of the School to estab- of the problems involved. In order to appraise the lish a chain of such research stations throughout the book it is necessary to consider in what respects the Empire as adequate funds were forthcoming, and to work of Willstatter differs from that of his -Dredesend out expeditions from time to time to the tropics. cessors. In the first place, he has set out to place As Chairman of the building committee he recalled the preparation of enzymes on a quantitative basis, that at the conception it had been decided that the such as is customary in experiments in synthetic first condition laid down for competing architects organic chemistry, for example, and he has considered should be " Let there be Light," and in the employ- in all cases the number of units of enzyme activity ment of half a million sterling real concern he believed recovered after purification as well as the unitand hoped had been shown to make the expenditure weight of the enzyme preparation. This outlook wide and judicious. The Director of the School, the led to a greatly increased efficiency in the various professors, and the departmental heads had throughout steps used in purification. Many of the methods been consulted in the construction of their laboratories employed by Willstatter are based on selective and workshops, and it had not been found necessary, adsorption of the enzyme on to various substances thanks to the generous measure of the Rockefeller such as alumina and kaolin, and subsequent removal gift, to refuse a single request for any piece of essential (elution), usually by alteration of the reaction of the equipment. He associated the Director, professors, and medium. Such processes are not new, but in the staff with the governors and the board of management hands of Willstatter and his colleagues they have in thanking His Royal Highness for the encouragement led to some remarkable results, such as the separaand inspiration of his presence. tion of enzymes from their closely associated conSir Gregory Foster, also, in thanking the Prince, taminants, from activators, and from other enzymes. said that the new School would rank as a part of the Willstatter considers that the enzymes are composed University of the metropolis-the University of the of a colloidal bearer and a specific, active group, capital city of the Empire-and that its work would which enables them to be bound to the substrate, be organised, not for London, and not even for the and the composition of the active group at the same Empire, but for the world. In alluding to the many time conditions the colloidal nature of the entire great men who had been educated at the University complex. One of the most striking facts which have of London, and who had gone forth to make the emerged from Willstatter’s researches is that the world a better and happier place, he said he would properties of the enzyme are often profoundly modimention one name only, that of Lord Lister, who was fied by their intensive purification. Thus the conventional view regarding the higher protein fission a graduate of the University of London, and received his education in London. The Vice-Chancellor products as the specific substrate of trypsin, which described in humorous terms the curiosity that had only hydrolyses these substances in the presence of been aroused in the neighbourhood by the new build- the activator enterokinase, has received a rude blow ing, the reason for whose existence the local public from some recent work of this school. Trypsin had not yet grasped, while he was certain that the prepared by adsorptive methods did not attack new School would increase the tradition of magnificent ordinary peptides when activated by enterokinase ; service in the cause of humanity which the University on the other hand, certain basic proteins, such as of London possessed, by sending back students, who the protamines and also the products of peptic had arrived from all parts of the world to be taught, digestion, are rapidly broken down even by the nonIn other respects the convenactivated enzyme. as missionaries of health. tional views receive short shrift from Prof. WaldHis Royal Highness then visited the museum, theschmidt-Leitz. Most text-books, even quite modern laboratories, and the lecture theatre, and before leavingones, state unequivocally that the gastric proteolytic the building met the workmen employed in its con- enzyme is secreted as an inactive zymogen known as struction who were having their mid-day meal in a pepsinogen or pro-pepsin, which is converted to the tent adjoining the premises. Here the health of the: active form by the action of the hydrochloric acid Royal visitor was drunk in beer with musical honours. in the stomach. This view is based on the observed A large number of those who were invited to be: effect of acid (which may more logically be regarded present at the opening ceremony remained to luncheon as a pH effect), and the varying stability to alkali as the guests of Lord Melchett, and afterwards, under of the active and inactive forms. This variation of the supervision of the Director, professors and stability may, however, be due to different amount members of the staff were shown around the building, of associated substances in the enzyme solutions and were present at cinematograph displays in the! under comparison. In any case the evidence in lecture theatre. favour of a zymogen precursor is very small.
Reviews and Notices of Books.
,
,
.
.
.
,