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100 YEARS AGO An interesting memoir, by C. T. Mörner, has recently appeared in the _Zeitschrift für physiologische Chemie_, dealing with a method of preserving fish, much employed in

northern Sweden. The fish are washed, and placed in wooden casks, and are then covered with brine. The casks are then closed and made airtight, and placed in the open air in a sunny place,

and allowed to remain there for from five to six weeks. The process of fermentation, which soon ensues, is controlled by means of a small vent-hole, which is opened from time to time.… As

soon as the requisite stage in the process has been reached, the casks are opened, and the now-finished article is packed in smaller vessels for storage and distribution. This article of

diet, known in Swedish as “surfisk,” is eaten either raw or toasted.… As accounting for the disagreeable odour which characterises this preparation, Mörner found amongst the gases emitted

during fermentation the offensive-smelling methylmercaptan. Amongst the organic acids discovered in the “surfisk,” whilst absent in the fresh fish, succinic acid, butyric acid, formic,

acetic, and valeric acids were detected.… Curiously indol, skatol, phenol, putrescine and cadaverine, so characteristic of putrefactive processes in general, were absent in this preparation.

From _Nature_ 19 August 1897. 50 YEARS AGO The Seventeenth International Physiological Congress was held in Oxford during July 21-25. It was attended by about 1,200 physiologists, including

welcome delegates from the USSR and China.… Perhaps the most important work reported has been in independent research, in which, after Prof. E. G. T. Liddell's phrase, after seven

years, members were showing an active post-inhibitory rebound. An outstanding paper was given by A. L. Hodgkin and A. F. Huxley, who suggested that during the rising phase of the action

potential in nerve, the membrane becomes highly permeable to sodium ions which then enter the cell. Potassium ions leave the cell during the falling phase and later restorative processes

occur linked with energy-producing mechanisms. There was considerable indirect evidence in favour of this view. From _Nature_ 23 August 1947. RIGHTS AND PERMISSIONS Reprints and permissions

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