WORK AMONG EATS

Shannon News, 9 December 1927, Page 3

WORK AMONG EATS

A WOMAN'S EXPERIMENTS. There is a charming youife woman in Knightsbridge whose great interest in life is the study of the anatomy of a, rat! But if is only a, .means to an end—a work of research—the results jot which, in the course of time, may have, an important bearing on medical science. Most pathologists know her. and she has already impressed the Jloyal Society of Medicine with the import-, onfc 0 . of her experiments. A London writer says:—"When 1 called to see Dr. Ethel Browning, I was told she had gone to University College to fetch some rats- ..Later a bright, attractive woman in the early thirties, invited mo into a private laboratory to examine rats undergoing special feeding in the cause of science. "J am working with Dr. M J. Howlands," said Dr. Browning. "He has been endeavouring'for many years to prove the value of vitamin B in our food." 'Vitamin Bis the growing wheat germ. "1 believe that we .dtall have to get back to Nature for our cures for disease," she explained. 'lf people led. a normal life and ate the right food there would be far less. f any, disease W e feel convinced that many cases of rheumatoid ar.lleitis spring from the intestines, and v. o hope to prove that it is Hie absence of vitamin B which is respons-ible-for. a great number of malignant omplaints.

'i use rats for my experiments to try and prove these theories. The ruts an bred on l">r. Rowlands' farm 11 the country, brought to the University College for killing, and to f Ms laboratory for post-mortem work. We

also keep a few live ones hero.'" Most women would shudder, and some would faint, at t.h e idea of Dr. Browning's work, bul although she Is essentially feminine and a gifted pianist and novelist, .she says she loves her researches, and has been eager to study medicine and bacteriology ever since she was a girl

"Here \i a deficiently-fed rat," Dr. Browning said, indicating a full-sized rat whose coat and general appearance showed signs of general malnutrition. "And here are the normally fed ones, in both white and brown. After the rats are killed by chloroform I remove their organs and pass them through various solutions in readiness for examination. They are afterwards put.into melted wax and allowed to set into these small blocks. Then they are cut into microscopic slices with a microtome knife, mourned on small glass plates, and each pi a t e —there are hundreds of them — Is kept and indexed for reference."