James Bayley Butler with the Royal Army Medical Corps, beginning as a lieutenant in 1915 and retiring a major after the war. For his service, he was awarded an MBE. Butler's primary research interest was in applied biology. He carried out research on "Catenaria anguillulae", a parasite of the ova of the liver fluke, from 1922 to 1932. Later on, Butler focused on the control of wood-boring beetles and the fungus that causes dry rot in wood "Serpula lacrymans". On this matter, he became an international expert, and assisted in the development of the company Biotox, which manufactured insecticides and fungicides for use
Serpula vigorous pumping movements of the abdomen and also by the activity of the ciliary tracts. The well-developed longitudinal muscles of the body wall of serpulids lack a special blood supply. The body surface in the larger serpulids, like "Serpula", has a rich blood supply, and the water in contact with this surface is constantly renewed. It seems probable that the outer body surface of serpulids serves as a respiratory membrane, supplying oxygen to the underlying muscles by diffusion. The biochemistry of the blood of "Serpula" is especially unusual in that the blood contains not only hemoglobin, but also chlorocruorin. While