160 A BIOMETRIC STUDY OF BASAL METABOLISM IN MAN. 



From these results they conclude that the constants "fail to show 

 any greater correlation with the body-surface as computed by the 

 Meeh formula than with the body- weight." 



Notwithstanding this clear evidence against the body-surface law 

 as applied to the individuals of the same species, Armsby, Fries, and 

 Braman conclude 78 that their assemblage of data for man, cattle, 

 hogs, and horses "tend to confirm the conclusions of E. Voit, that the 

 basal katabolism of different species of animals is substantially pro- 

 portional to their body surface." 



Total heat which is used as the final expression of basal metabolism 

 may be either directly or indirectly determined. In the case of indirect 

 calorimetry it is calculated from the total amounts of CO 2 or O 2 , taking 

 into account the calorific value of the gas which varies with the respira- 

 tory quotient, i.e., the ratio C0 2 /02. 



TABLE 55. Comparison of correlation between body-weight and oxygen-consumption ivith the 

 correlations between body-surface by the two formulas and oxygen-consumption. 



We turn, therefore, to a consideration of the correlations between 

 body-weight and oxygen consumption and carbon-dioxide production 

 in comparison with those for the two measures of body-surface and 

 oxygen consumption and carbon-dioxide production. The results are 

 given for oxygen consumption in table 55 and for carbon-dioxide 

 output in table 56. The value of r wo and r wc are taken from table 24. 



While the differences in the correlations are very small a great 

 majority are positive in sign, i.e., they indicate that the correlations 

 for surface-area and metabolism are higher than those for weight and 

 metabolism. Thus these results seem to indicate that body-surface 



73 Armsby, Fries, and Briumm, Proc. Nat. Acad. Sci., 1918, 4, p. 3-4. 



